Know-It-All
by Techliche
Summary: Story of Bamon. Love, hate. Break Up, Make up. All the teenaged angst you could cram into a pop album. Slight AU, mostly follows canon.
1. Track 1- Seventeen

**A/N: I love Alessia Cara's album Know It All. Listen to it and tell me it's not a love/hate story about Bamon. I dare you. Each Chapter is named after and based off of a track in the album. I hope you enjoy. And honestly if this story hasn't already been done before, I think it's a damn shame.**

 **Disclaimer of the lyrics to Alessia Cara's songs and TVD characters.**

Track #1- Seventeen

 _My daddy says that life comes at you fast_

 _We all like blades of grass_

 _We come to prime and in time we just wither away_

 _And it all changes….._

Bonnie sat digging through piles of boxes in the bottom of her closet. It had been years since she had gone through some of these things and looking back she couldn't remember why she saved some it. Plastic souvenir pompoms and noise makers from her cheerleading days, stuffed animals won at fairs, fliers from Mystic Falls Founders events. All these mementos from her youth collected into boxes that haven't seen the light of day since before she started college.

One box held stubs of candles, crystals, feathers, a small vial of dirt and scraps of paper. She opened a few of them, some were notes passed between her and her friends; some were attempts at original spells. She was such a pack rat.

 _It's time,_ she thought to herself. She didn't want or need any of these things anymore. They only served to remind her of what she had lost.

Bonnie stuffed what she could into trashbags, until she came across a photo album with ' _2010'_ scrawled across it in purple sharpie. Bonnie traced her finger over Caroline's handwriting. She smiled thinking of how Care used to practice how she wanted her messy handwriting to look so it turned out looking both casual and cool.

Bonnie sighed and stood, leaving the dusty trinkets of the past where they lay in the floor and took the photo album over to her bed. She turned on the lamp next to her and took a breath before opening the album.

 _My view with a looking glass won't catch the past_

 _Only photographs remind us of the passing of days…_

The first couple pages were filled with pictures of Bonnie and Caroline and Elena, cheesing at the camera. Bonnie looked at her younger self, surrounded people she loved. Matt and Jeremy. Tyler. Even Alaric made an appearance looking mortified at having been caught on film surrounded by his underage students.

 _My mother said don't forget where you come from, where you've been_

 _Always keep your closest friends they can't slip away…_

They were all there. The people that had meant the most to her. Her entire world in those days.

Even him.

 _But never were there truer words_

 _In all my days I've ever heard_

 _And when she told me little girl the answer is love…_

He smirked at her from under the plastic film covering his photo. Bonnie inhales a shaky breath and snaps the album closed.

She suddenly decides she doesn't want to do this alone. She needs reinforcements. If she has pull up all this old shit from her past she's damn sure gonna have help.

She snags her phone from beside her and crosses to the room to her desk, sending an S.O.S text on the way: _Need help packing, please save me! I've got booze!_

Bonnie refills her wineglass and sips; waits for a response. It's quick, as she knew it would be: _Omw. Do you have boxes?_

Bonnie rolls her eyes in amusement. She expected nothing less from her slightly neurotic best friend. The girl knew her way too well. _I've got a few…_

Again, Caroline responds so fast Bonnie thinks she already had it typed before she even received her first message: _Smh I'll be there in 35._

Bonnie took her wineglass and scanned her bedroom trying to decide her next point of attack. She could do the bookcase while she waited for Care to arrive.

She dragged one of her empty boxes to the wide bookshelves that spanned an entire wall of her childhood bedroom. She tried her best to focus on the task at hand: clearing the shelves, sorting things into To Keep, To Donate, and To Trash piles.

But her eyes keep dragging back to that book on her nightstand. The book filled with pages and pages of the records of the best times of her life.

 _Wow,_ she thought, _really? The best time of my life?_ She tried to think of a time that she was happier than her junior and senior year of high school. Because truthfully that should have been the worst time of her life. It was the year that altered the course of her life forever.

But she couldn't say that all of it was bad. She had lost so many loved ones, but she survived it.

 _I been goin on, I been growin up_

 _I'm a know it all, I don't know enough_

She returned to the floor of her closet and dug through the last of the boxes. This particular box she had purposely not opened in years. She had quite literally closed the door on this chapter of her life and hadn't seen the need to reopen it again since. But here she was, on the verge of earning her graduate degree and leaving to start a new career outside of the world she's known all her life. No time like the present to rip the band-aid off the past.

This box was filled with him. Photos, clothes, chopsticks, CDs, shoes- she'd forgotten she'd thrown those boots in here, they used to be her favorite pair- Bonnie dug through all of it until she found what she was looking for.

A framed picture. Man, she looked so young there…

 _See I was racing and waiting for the day that I would be old enough_

 _Guess I'll be patient and pace myself gotta prepare for when goings rough…_

But him. He was ageless as he stood with his arms locked her, peaking up with a wicked grin at the cameraman that had caught him having just planted a kiss on her bare neck.

Just that picture alone sent a burst of warmth straight to her stomach and a tingle between her thighs.

Bonnie shook her head at herself. After all these years, seeing him in an old photograph still did that to her… she was beyond hopeless.

To feel the exact same at twenty-five that she did then. If only she knew then what she knows now. She could have saved herself the heartache of having fallen in love with Damon Salvatore.

 _Now I wish I could freeze the time at seventeen…_

 **A/N: Leave me a comment or a review please! I'm not too proud to beg. And yes it is short. Sorry, I wanted to put it out before I chickened out it..**


	2. Track 2- Here

**A/N: After Bonnie has sat down to dig through her past relationships in the last chapter, the rest of the story happens in the past, when she was seventeen and finding herself. Lets says its season 3. I'm not a stickler for details so don't hate me too much for that.**

Track #2- Here

 _I'm sorry if I seem uninterested_

 _Or I'm not listenin' or I'm indifferent…._

Bonnie sat alone at one of the round tables spread throughout the hall draped in silk linens and set with fine china and more silverware than she'd ever seen in her life.

She was bored out of her skull and had been ready to go from the moment she stepped foot in the door. She was prepared to never forgive Caroline for making her come to this event and then abandoning her to literally dance with the devil all night. Bonnie knew it was an act to keep Klaus busy and distracted while Damon, Stefan, and Elena pumped the rest of the Mikaelson brood for information. Didn't keep her from resenting every last one of them.

A passing waiter offered her a glass a champagne and she took it without hesitation, needing something in her system to keep her from wanting to set the place ablaze just for something to do.

 _Truly, I ain't got no business here_

 _But since my friends are here…_

"Well, you sure seem to be enjoying yourself," came the voice of the last person she wanted to talk to.

Bonnie looked up at a smirking blue-eyed Salvatore and had to force herself not react outwardly. She smiled sweetly and sipped her drink. "You know me, I'm just a little wallflower."

Inside she was sucking her teeth, rolling her eyes, and envisioning melting the skin from the vampires bones.

"Oh, I'm sure that's what you would like us all to think." Damon stood, his posture somehow both casual and regal at the same time, only furthering Bonnie's annoyance with him.

"What do you want, Damon? I'm really not in the mood to play with you right now." Bonnie crossed her left leg over her right and shifted so she could see around Damon to the dancefloor where Klaus was twirling her friend. It looked like Caroline was putting her obsession for _Dancing With the Stars_ to good use.

Damon's eyes dropped to take in the vast amount of leg Bonnie revealed through the slit in her floor length gown . It stopped about 6 inches shy of her hip and showed off her toned caramel thigh, her delicate knee, and her sculpted calf down to her dainty ankle wrapped in a strappy little sandal displaying the silver polish on her manicured toes. Her hair was softly curled and pinned to the side with rhinestone clips, leaving her shoulders bare in her sleeveless royal blue gown. She may not be having fun tonight but damn the girl cleans up well.

"You clean up pretty good Bonnie, I would've never guessed you owned anything outside of peasant blouses and blue jeans," he managed to compliment and take a dig at her in the same breath.

 _I would rather be at home all by myself not in this room_

 _With people who don't even care about my well-being…._

Bonnie pinched her lips together in an effort to remain cool and not blow her cover by starting a fight with him in the middle of the party. But she wasn't going to sit there trading insults with him either. If it weren't for the fact that she was here acting as the 'magical muscle' in case things went south, she would have skipped this charade altogether.

"Aren't you supposed to be babysitting Elena? Or did she ditch you for a better date?" Damn, she just couldn't quite help herself.

"I guess you could say that. She convinced Stefan to take a turn on the dance floor." His eyes drifted to the pair looking as smitten as ever. "I noticed you were sitting over here all by your lonesome. Don't suppose you'd like to join me for a dance?" Damon pulled out his most charming of smiles for the witch and offered her his hand.

 _I don't dance, don't ask, I don't need a boyfriend…._

Bonnie looked from his outstretched hand to his ridiculously attractive face, and couldn't tell if he was serious or not. Regardless, she didn't come to this thing to be pitied.

"Don't suppose I do. Now please, feel free to go bother someone else," she politely dismissed him.

"Honey, if you're waiting for a better offer you're gonna be sitting here for a while. Don't you have a built in date, anyway? Where's Little Gilbert at tonight?" Damon pulled out the chair next to Bonnie and took a seat.

Bonnie sighed when she realize he wasn't going to go away. "I stupidly told him to stay away from this event. I thought there would be a bit more…. Excitement," she lifted her eyebrow, hinting at the fact that the evening was going smoother than any of them had expected.

Damon was surprised as well. Everyone seemed to be on their best behavior. Caroline was doing her job in keeping Klaus entertained and Matt had held Rebecca's attention all night. Even Kol had found someone to make him look like an upstanding citizen for a few hours.

It seemed as if Bonnie and Damon were the only two not enjoying the festivities.

"Yeah, I was hoping for a bit more 'excitement' as well," he admitted with a slight grimace, his eyes boring holes in his brothers back.

"At least you came of your own volition," Bonnie snorted. "I was practically kidnapped and stuffed into a dress and heels and was made to come."

"I thought girls loved playing dress up and high and society and lah-ti-dah…" Damon waved a hand around gesturing at the excessive decorations, the decadent food, and the live string quartet in the corner. "You telling me this isn't your kind of party?"

 _Excuse me if I seem a little unimpressed with this_

 _An anti-social pessimist but usually I don't mess with this..._

"Are you kidding me? I would literally rather be anywhere else on the planet right now than here, pretending to give a shit about half the people in this room that look down their noses at me just because my last name doesn't fit into their elitist social construct."

Damon's eyebrows raised in surprise. That was just about the most that the witch had ever said to him outside of shop talk of vampires, spells, and Elena's impending demise. He didn't know if it was the champagne talking or her natural self slipping through the cracks of her ever polite facade, but he found he kind of preferred it.

"You really don't want to be here do you?" he chuckled.

"What gave it away?" She dazzled him with one of the fakest smiles he had ever seen before tossing back the rest of her drink. Damon's eyes followed the lines of her throat as she tipped her head back.

"So, let's go get some air," he stood from his seat and waited for Bonnie to do the same.

"We can't just leave Damon, we did come for a reason," she said, lowering her voice, referring to the fact that they were both supposed to be keeping an eye on Elena.

"She's fine, she's got Steffy to protect her," Damon glanced back to the crowded floor. "And I don't really think we'd be missed."

"Damon…" Bonnie shook her head.

"Fine, you can continue sitting here like a bump on a log. I'm gonna go find a bottle of Dom. Or two" He strolled away and left her there staring sadly at her empty glass.

Elena did seem to be doing just fine on her own tonight….

And it's not like the bar was serving minors…

Bonnie sighed and followed after Damon, catching up to him on the quiet verandah outside.

"Here," he passed her a bottle of Dom Perignon and kept one for himself. He carefully pushed the cork off and held it away from his suit as the bubbly beverage spilled out the top.

Bonnie slowly pulled the foil off her bottle, and Damon chuckled at her. "Did you need help with that?"

Bonnie glared at him briefly, hearing the challenge in his tone. Caroline always liked popping the corks, so she'd never done it before, but it couldn't be that hard. Still, she felt the need to set Damon straight and show off just a little, so she concentrated on the cork for a few seconds and when it popped and shot out into the night off the side of the balcony she squealed in delight.

"Nevermind. Neat party trick," Damon said, impressed.

"Thank you," Bonnie smiled at her own ingenuity and carefully wiped off the bottle and shook the excess champagne from her fingers.

Damon watched as she put her fingers to lips and sucked off the last few drops of stray liquid. "I wonder... what other tricks have you got up your sleeve?"

"Ha, wouldn't you like to know," Bonnie smirked. " You couldn't have grabbed a couple glasses! while you were at it?" Bonnie tipped the full bottle to her lips and sipped.

"You know what they say about beggars being choosers, Bonnie," Damon said.

"And when have you ever been a beggar?"

"Fair. Maybe I just enjoy watching you rough it."

"Right, because drinking expensive champagne straight from the bottle is roughing it," Bonnie rolled her eyes and went to sit on a bench off in a corner. Damon followed her lead but instead of sitting next to her, he hopped up on the wide rail of the balcony.

"Tell me then, what is Bonnie Bennett's drink of choice?" he asked.

"Underage, remember?" Bonnie pointed at herself.

"So? That stops exactly nobody in this county and it's not like you're drinking chocolate milk tonight."

"I'm just saying, it's not like I have a whole lot of topshelf options. It's mostly whatever beer happens to be in the keg or some nasty concoction that gets passed around." Bonnie shook her head, remembering the last party she went to had featured a purple drink that just about knocked her on her ass. "This is pretty good though, even if it is bubbly."

"Not a fan of bubbles huh?" Damon was watching Bonnie loosen up bit by bit now, the alcohol having its intended effect.

"They usually give me the hiccups and no one wants to be _that_ girl at the party."

"Why not?"

"It's embarrassing. And ridiculous. Like all of a sudden you lose the ability to breathe properly, you can't control your own body, and you sound like a freaking cartoon drunk. But I'm sure Damon Salvatore doesn't have those problems."

"Not exactly a problem when you don't technically need to breathe anymore." Damon smirked and, as if to prove the point, took a long pull from his bottle and smacked his lips with a loud and refreshing "Aaaahh," for good measure.

"Jerk," Bonnie rolled her eyes and took a slow sip.

"Don't be jealous," he teased.

"Oh I am definitely not jealous. Why would I be jealous of a dead man? A diversion from nature?"

"Here comes the magic lecture. I thought we were having a good time?"

"No lecture. I'm sure I don't have to tell you the many ways in which I've got it better than you do."

"What?! Okay, you need to lay off the sauce, because you must be drunk to think you have it better than me! I'm practically a superhero."

"There is no way in hell you are a super anything, let alone a hero! And I totally have it better! Watch." Bonnie was feeling bold now. The night air combined with the bubbly was giving her a confidence she hadn't had earlier.

She glanced around making sure they weren't being watched before she stood up.

"Hold this," she handed him her drink.

"Oh god, this better be good," Damon laughed.

"It will be!" Bonnie fired right back. She stood still and closed her eyes, focusing on the slight breeze blowing around her. The more she focused on it the stronger the wind became, circling around her, whipping her hair around wildly. Suddenly she turned in a circle three times and when she stopped, her gown, which had been royal blue, was blood red in color.

"Cool, huh!" she grinned, and twisted and turned showing off her newly recolored dress.

"Wow… that's gonna be so useful when you audition for Project Runway," Damon rolled his eyes.

"Whatever! That was awesome," Bonnie snatched her bottle back and returned to the bench.

"No, that was useless." Damon chugged his bottle empty and then chucked it over the railing. "This is awesome."

In the blink of an eye Damon was gone, but returned in another blink with the bottle in his hand again.

"Oh please, that wasn't nearly as cool as my dress!" she complained.

"Ok, it was pretty lame, but the point is, my super speed beats your stupid two-tone fabric."

"Ok, fine how bout this?" Bonnie snatched his empty bottle from him and flung it as high out over the balcony as she could, only this time she kept her arm raised and her palm out and muttered something in what sounded like Latin to Damon. He watched as the bottle stopped and hovered perfectly still in midair.

"That all?" he yawned.

"Not exactly." She snapped her fingers and the thick glass burst into dust and rained down on the lawn below. "How's that for useless?" Bonnie's grin was smug as she caught Damon's look of surprise before he could fix his face.

"That was… pretty good actually." Damon conceded. "It's not super strength or hearing, but I can see it's value."

"Thank god you approve, now my life has meaning," Bonnie snarked and went back to drinking.

"You're kinda sassy when you're intoxicated," Damon admired. "It's almost like you're enjoying my company."

"Shit. Then I _must_ be more tipsy than I thought." Bonnie shook her head. All joking aside, for a moment there she had been having fun with Damon. That sobered her up a little. She wasn't sure if she should keep drinking till she stopped analyzing how weird it was to not loathe the cocky self sure vamp, or if she should abstain from ever drinking again.

Damon seemed to notice she was reconsidering her behavior towards him, and before she could get too far into her own head, he reached out and pulled the bottle from her grasp. "Tell you what- I won't ever speak of this night if you won't. And tomorrow we return to hating each other with every fiber of our being?" he offered.

"Deal, but you have to go get your own drink, this one's mine!" she tried to take the bottle back from him but he held it out of her reach.

"You can share, it's not like you're gonna finish it on your own," he took a long swig before she snatched it away, dripping champagne down his front.

"We've already established that you have no idea what I'm capable of," she challenged. Just to prove him wrong she tipped the bottle to her lips and took a long drink. So long in fact that when she finished she turned the bottle upside down to show him it was empty.

"I guess you showed me," he praised her feat, noticing her already swaying. "You know you're gonna regret that, right?"

Bonnie shrugged, feeling both smug and buzzed. "What now party master?"

"What now indeed?" The impish gleam in his eye should have told her he had nothing good in mind. "What do you usually do once you polish off a bottle before your hiccups kick in?"

"Ummm….I dance," she answered honestly.

"You want to dance?"

"Oh, god no, I don't wanna dance to that classical shit. I mean really dance," Bonnie gyrated her hips, her body and mind providing a silent soundtrack no one else could hear. "But I can't do that here."

"Who says?" Damon asked, trying not fixate on how delicious she looked.

"Them," she waves a hand at the party going on inside. "They say I have to dress a certain way, act a certain way…. be a certain way."

Damon saw her previous shine dim just a bit. "So why listen to them? If it doesn't make you happy why bother?"

"Because."

"Because what?" Damon was genuinely curious. It should have bothered him that he was so curious about the inner thoughts of this teenaged witch but tonight he found her fascinating, a distraction from his own situation. He'd unravel the implications of that later. Or never.

"Because they're my best friends. They need me. And I need them," Bonnie replied like it was mostly simple equation in the world.

"That doesn't explain why you'd let them dictate your life. If you don't want to do something, don't do it." his own response was equally simple.

"It's not that easy, Damon."

"Sure it is. You want something, take it. Or earn it or whatever. But if there is anything I've learned in my hundred and seventy odd years, it's that you can't wait or depend on anyone else to make you happy. You've gotta do that shit yourself."

"What do you know, Damon? Vampires like you are half the problem. Hell, you're the entire problem! You blow into town compelling people and confusing people and eating people and demanding people open tombs for you so you get your long lost girlfriend back. How's that working out for you, huh?"

"That's exactly my point! I waited almost a hundred and fifty years to be happy and it blew up in my face. Don't let anybody dictate your happy, Bonnie. They're not worth the wait."

He leaned against the railing, looking out at the night sky. The conversation had taken a turn and he was ready to abandon their little side party and head back in.

"God. And I thought my situation was depressing," she sighed.

"Gee, thanks," Damon rolled his eyes.

"What, do you want me to feel sorry for you? That's not gonna happen. You do shitty things then shitty things happen to you, that's how karma works. Nature will have its balance."

"Here we go with the nature bullshit. Now I need a real drink. Come on Bennett." Damon pulled her to her feet and led her inside to formal study.

Bonnie collapsed on the couch and sighed. "What a waste of a night. Nobody even got violent or anything," she complained.

"Careful what you wish for, night's not over yet." Damon found a stash of brandy and poured himself a drink.

"It is for me. I'm done with guard duty. The shoes are coming off!"

"On a scale of one to ten, how drunk are you actually?"

"Ssseven?" she slurred.

"Great."

"Ssimmer down. I don't even have the hiccups."

Bonnie was asleep before Damon even finished his first glass.

 _Yo I'll be over here…._

 **A/N: All Bamon. All talk and drabble. And they agreed to go back to hating each other tomorrow, but a bond has formed. And I've never actually attempted to take champagne to the head so I don't know if that would have been possible for little miss bennett but lets pretend it is shall we.**


	3. Track 3- Outlaws

Track #3- Outlaws

 _Run, run like the devil's behind us_

 _Run to where no one can find us_

 _Be my accomplice to my crime…_

Things spiraled quickly after that night at the party. Somehow between getting Bonnie drunk off her ass and making sure she got home safely, Damon decided she wasn't quite as bad as he'd first thought her to be.

When Elena busted up their side party to let them know that the ball was over, Bonnie had caught her second wind and was doing impersonations of their entire gang of friends. And the disapproval on both her and Stefan's faces only cracked Bonnie and Damon up even more.

"What are you guys doing in here alone?" Elena asked.

"See!" Bonnie pointed out in a fit of giggles.

"Leave here alone, she can't help it," Damon leapt to Elena's defense, even as he struggled not to laugh right along with Bonnie.

"What are you talking about?" Elena asked.

"There it is again!" Bonnie laughed.

"Is she _drunk_?" Elena accused Damon.

"And third time's the charm!" Bonnie was hollering at this point.

"Yeah no, I hear it now. Thanks so much for pointing that out, by the way," Damon said, voice dripping in sarcasm. Now he was sure to notice every single time Elena asked another asinine question. "It's nothing Elena, and she's fine. She's not even hiccuping."

"Nope. No hiccups!" Bonnie sang.

"Okay, well let's get you home sweetie." Elena pulled Bonnie to her feet and caught her when she started to fall over. "What the hell did you do to her Damon?"

"Me? That girl's a lushy mess all on her own, I just happen to make an excellent drinking buddy," he smirked and pushed in between Elena and Bonnie. "Come on Lushy, before Mama Bear sics Brother Bear on me." He swooped her up in his arms and carried her out of the room, while she laughed the whole way and asked him if he'd ever thought about being a fireman.

Damon promised Elena that he would get Bonnie home safe and sound after he stuffed her in the passenger seat of her car. He bid the doppelganger goodnight, told her how beautiful she had looked, kissed her cheek, and watched her climb into a limo and ride off with his brother.

"Come on Romeo, take me home!" Bonnie honked her horn at him incessantly.

"You're lucky you make a cute drunk, Bennett," he griped.

…..

After that, Caroline claimed the two were inseparable. She said Bonnie was always sneaking off with Damon and blowing off her friends.

"I had no idea you and Damon were so close now, Bon," she started in on Bonnie one afternoon a few weeks after the party. They had been finishing up lunch at the Grille when Damon texted Bonnie to meet him at the boarding house.

"We're not close," Bonnie replied with a grimace.

"He just texted you to come meet him and you're going. No questions asked."

"Because I already know what it's about. He's been looking into a witch for me, hopefully he's actually come up with something useful this time," Bonnie explained.

"Still, you two have been hanging out more often lately…" Caroline trailed off, letting the implication hang in the air.

"Ew, no! We do not 'hang out'! We team up! We rescue our friends, no wait- my friends from danger, and then he buys me booze after. That's not 'hanging out'. That's basically a full time job!"

"Why is he 'teaming up' with you and not Stefan? Or Elena? Or any number of other vampires he knows?" Caroline continued her argument.

"I don't know Care, why don't you ask him? Contrary to whatever you think, I don't know his every move and intention, okay. But for now, I'm gonna get some info on this witch and I will talk to you later. Love you, bye." Bonnie smiled, trying to let her friend know she was being paranoid and worried over nothing.

…..

In retrospect, maybe Care was right to worry, just a tiny bit. It turned out that the lead Damon had found on his mystery witch had morphed into a spur of the moment trip to New Haven, Connecticut. Damon swung by Bonnie's house, she grabbed a couple changes of clothes and they hit the road. Neither of them thought much of it; it's not like it was some romantic getaway, just a business trip.

After they'd been on the road for a while Bonnie brought up her conversation with Caroline.

"Care thinks we're spending too much time together."

"And did you tell her to mind her own fucking business?" he replied.

"No, Damon, because I actually know how to talk to people. I told her whatever she thinks is going on she's wrong."

"What does she think is going on?" Damon asked, his face scrunched in confusion.

"She thinks we hang out together."

"Hang out?" Damon knew lingo was generational, so he wasn't entirely sure what she meant by 'hang out'. "That's not a sexual reference is it?"

"Oh my god, no! Jesus, what is wrong with you? No." Bonnie was appalled his mind would even go there. "You're worse than Caroline. She thinks we're like 'friends' or something." Bonnie put finger quotes around the word _friends_ , but that only confused Damon more.

"Why are you saying it like that? Is 'friends' a sexual reference?"

"Would you get your mind outta the gutter for like a second. Nobody is referring to sex but you!"

"Is this your way of telling me you want to be... 'friends'?" He was still using the finger quotes, his voice saturated with innuendo.

"Nevermind. Just drop it," she regretted bringing any of this up.

"Hey, you started it."

"I was just trying to share a funny a story and you had to go make it dirty," Bonnie rolled her eyes and glared out the window.

"That's the price of being 'friends' with me, toots," he grinned over at her, and tickled her ear. She smacked his hand away.

"Don't call me toots and that's what I was getting at before you made it weird. We are not even friends! We are at best partners or associates, but Caroline's getting all freaked out over nothing!"

"Well that's blondies M.O. Blowing shit out of proportion. Stefan's the same way. He thinks I'm a bad influence on you," Damon scoffed.

"You're a terrible influence."

"Hey!"

"What, I can't help it if he's right!"

"How is he right? You are the most stubborn person I've ever met, I couldn't pressure you into anything you didn't already want to do, no matter how hard I tried."

"That's true, I wouldn't be here right now if I didn't actually want to be."

"See, you like being around me."

"I wouldn't say all that. But you do serve your purpose every now and then."

"Just think how helpful I'd be if we were… 'friends'." he wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"And now we're done." Bonnie dropped her shades over her eyes and pretended to sleep for the duration of the trip.

….

New Haven turned out to be a bust, but it was only the first in a string of trips Damon and Bonnie took trying to track down information about a coven of witches strong enough to take out the original hybrid without killing his bloodline. So far they had come up with nothing.

Bonnie was so focused on their mission that she didn't notice when she went a week without talking to her friends outside of school. Jeremy noticed though.

"Bonnie this is ridiculous, I haven't seen you all week and I miss you," he whined over the phone one night while Bonnie was pouring through research with Damon.

"Babe, I know I've been busy, but we are so close finding a way to get rid of Klaus. That's what we all want right? To have him out of our lives for good?"

"Yes, of course, but he doesn't have to ruin our lives in the meantime does he?"

"Well, Jer, that's kind of what he does…" Bonnie was getting annoyed.

"You know what I mean," he sighed.

"I'm really not sure I do. Everyone expects me to come up with a solution, but nobody but Damon is willing to put in the work. Look, I gotta go, I'll call you later."

Jeremy sighed into the phone; he didn't even pretend to believe her when she said that anymore. "Fine. I love you, Bonnie."

"Goodnight, Jer."

… _._

 _Run, run 'cause we're guilty as sin_

 _Run 'cause we know we won't win_

 _We know together we kill time..._

"Do you think you could possibly keep your little boyfriend on a leash? 'Cus the next time he comes barking at me, I will bite back," Damon threatened as he pushed his way into her house and promptly made himself comfortable on her couch.

"What the hell are you talking about Damon? And why are you here?" Bonnie had long since invited Damon inside, but if she'd known he would make a habit of showing up unannounced she would have rethought her decision to do so. She closed the door behind him and followed him into her living room.

Damon glanced over at her and noticed her looking super comfy in a pair of sweats and a tank top with her hair up in a messy bun and he grinned. She caught the look and flipped him off in return.

"Little Gilbert just tried to pick a fight with me at the Grille," he clicked through the channels of her tv looking for something better to watch than whatever reality crap she had on.

"Hey, I was watching that," she fought him for the remote and won and switched back to her show. "Why did Jeremy pick a fight with you? This time?"

Damon rolled his eyes and launched into his side of the story. "Apparently, I ruined his date night tonight, because you blew him off to do some kind of research with me. Imagine my surprise. Because as far I knew, you had other plans and couldn't do research tonight."

Bonnie chewed her lip, knowing she'd been caught in her lie. "What'd you tell him?"

"Well, you know me, I don't like being accused of something I didn't do…"

She just stared at him with a blank face.

"I told him to fuck off and find someone who actually gave a shit."

Bonnie gave him a grim grin, "Sounds about right. I bet he took that well." Bonnie retreated into her kitchen for a moment and returned with a glass and a bottle of whiskey. She topped off her own glass and then poured one for Damon.

"About as well as can be expected. When are you gonna bite the bullet and just cut him loose?"

"I keep trying, but I don't want to hurt him, Damon," she took a gulp from her glass and sighed as the liquor burned down to her stomach.

"Well, can you at least give me a heads-up when I'm supposed to corroborate your alibi?" Damon really didn't want to get in the middle of her relationship drama. Hell, he still couldn't believe the witch was in a relationship with Gilbert, Jr. To him, they had never made sense and recently, it seemed Bonnie had begun to see that as well.

"Sure."

Her monosyllabic response alerted Damon to her mood. "What's with you?"

"Nothing," she shrugged and slumped back into the couch.

"Bullshit. You're being moody or broody. Or both." Damon tried to read her face but she was stonewalling him, revealing nothing. "Is this about boy troubles? Because you know I don't do boy troubles."

"It's not about Jeremy."

"Then what is it?"

Bonnie sighed. She knew he wouldn't relent until he got something out of her. "It's…" She cleared her throat. "Today- It's been a year since Grams…" she struggled to finish that sentence.

Shit. That was even worse than Damon thought it would be. "Bonnie-"

"I'm fine. I just didn't really feel up to being around anybody tonight. I was feeling a little 'broody'." She sent a glare his way.

"And I just barged in here anyway. You want me to leave?" He didn't want to leave her alone like this, but he'd understand if he was the last person she wanted to be around.

But she shook her head. She didn't feel like talking to anybody, but that was the nice thing about Damon; sometimes he actually did just shut up and let her be.

She'd learned a lot about him over the last couple trips they had taken. Like that he enjoyed silence just as much as he enjoyed filling silence with his own voice, it just depended on his mood.

Against all of her efforts they had actually become friends. No air quotes needed, just friends. He was someone she could talk to about things she couldn't share with Caroline and Elena. Mostly about Caroline and Elena. And he talked to her about, what else, Elena. She understood why he was so in love with her even when it was never going to happen for him, and she knew he just needed an escape and distraction from his more destructive tendencies. So she let him drag her all over kingdom come on a wild goose chase that could possibly lead to absolutely nothing. Because in the end it didn't really matter. They both needed to be doing something. Why not do it together?

The problem only arose once everyone around them finally took notice of their little arrangement…

…..

The night Klaus forced Bonnie to unlink him and his siblings was the same night that Rebecca decided to go all fatal attraction on Damon's ass.

Bonnie was so pissed that she had been caught with her guard down and had allowed Klaus's minions to over power her. Of course she blamed Damon; he was supposed to meet her at the Grille but he blew her off. She assumed Elena was in some kind of distress and needed one or both of the Salvatore brothers to come to her rescue.

So, she was quite shocked to see him chained to the ceiling with Rebecca carving her initials into him like he was leather seats in a Carrie Underwood song. He looked like shit and wasn't moving much and honestly it scared the crap out of Bonnie to see him like that. For a second she couldn't move, she froze in panic and didn't know what to do, until Klaus all but kicked her out of his house.

She was practically hyperventilating when she made it to her car. She sat in the front seat shaking and trying to calm herself.

She had to call someone, she needed help. But the person she always called for help was the one who needed rescuing this time.

Once her breathing was closer to normal she realized she needed to move fast; Damon needed her.

She moved her car out of the Mikaelson driveway and down the street, before calling in a favor from Matt. She told him she needed him to get Rebecca out of the house for a little while and he agreed to ask her out. After that she called Caroline to do the same with Klaus, only she wasn't quite so cooperative. She demanded to know what was going on and only when Bonnie said it was life or death did she agree to distract Klaus, yet again.

Bonnie watched from behind the bushes lining their driveway as both the Mikaelson siblings left, before using her magic to sneak in and find Damon.

He was bleeding from everywhere it seemed. She couldn't understand how he was still bleeding, there was so much blood already covering the tarp on the ground.

"Bon…" he groaned. "What are you… doin' here?" he managed to croak out from between his dry and cracked lips. His eyes were going in and out of focus.

"Me? What are you doing here? How the hell did you manage to piss off Rebecca?"

"Didn't send … flowers after I banged her…" he chuckled.

"You know what, don't talk. Just enjoy being rescued." She used the same trick she showed him the night of the party and the iron cuffs around his wrists burst into clouds of dust. She managed to get his arm over her shoulders before he hit the floor entirely.

"Okay, just stay with me, Damon. I can't do this if you pass out on me," she grunted under his weight. Her magic steadied him and kept him from hitting the ground.

"So then why'd you come back for me?" he was shuffling forward, moving his feet and with every step it felt like his last.

"oh, shut up. I wasn't gonna let you die in there. What kind of friend would that make me?" They were outside now, crossing the great lawn to where she had parked her car.

"Just like every other friend I've ever had," he gave her a weak grin.

"Wow, that's pretty pathetic, Salvatore," Bonnie opened her car door and shoved him inside her backseat. She sighed in relief and exhaustion, resting her hands on her knees to catch her breath. "You need better friends."

"Nah, 'ts what I got you for…" he mumbled before he passed out.

Bonnie got him to the boarding house in record time, but no way was she dragging his unconscious body all by herself again. She screamed for Stefan to come help her and he came flying out of the house like he was on fire.

He took one look at her covered in blood and nearly lost his shit, before he smelled it wasn't hers. He looked in the backseat to find his brother half naked and also covered in blood. "What the hell happened, Bonnie?"

"Help me get him inside!"

"Bonnie!?" Elena came running from the house in a panic. "What happened to him? Are you okay?"

"He's gonna be fine, Elena, we just need to get him inside." Bonnie pulled her friend out of the way so Stefan could get Damon out of the car. He eased Damon's big body over his shoulder in a move that was way more elegant than it should've been and in a blur he was gone. Bonnie took off after them with Elena screeching questions at her a mile a minute.

"Who did this Bonnie? Why didn't you call me? How did you find him? Were you two together-"

"No, Elena! Do you think if I was with him, this would've happened in the first place?!" Bonnie screamed.

"Why are you yelling at me? I'm just trying to understand what happened to him and you're not telling me anything!" Elena had tears in her eyes and Bonnie was trying hard not to keep yelling at her.

"He's gonna be fine," she repeated.

They reached Damon's room where Stefan had dumped him in his giant tub and was running a bath.

"Here, let me help," Bonnie and Elena stepped forward at the same time to get Damon undressed. Stefan however wasn't having it.

"Guys, I've got it. You wanna help- Elena go get him some blood bags. Bonnie- find some clean sweats to put him in," Stefan calmly and easily took charge of the situation.

Elena took off running, but for the second time that night Bonnie couldn't make herself move. She just stood there, looking at her friend losing what little color he had had in the first place. Deathly pale and still, she couldn't tell if he was even breathing anymore.

"Bonnie?" Stefan's voice was still calm and she tried to let it soothe her frazzled nerves. "Can you tell me what happened tonight? Do you know who did this?"

She only nodded her head, but couldn't find the words. Her mind was swimming as she tried to recall what happened before she found Damon. But all she saw was his face right before Klaus kicked her out. He'd looked ready give up.

"Bonnie?" This time Stefan's voice sounded so far away that when she finally looked up into his eyes she was surprised to find him standing right next her.

Good thing too, because in the next moment she blacked out and collapsed in his arms.

….

 _You'll never face a judge without me_

 _You'll never battle the gavel alone…_

When Bonnie came to, the first thing she noticed was that she didn't recognize the room she was in. Then she realized what had woke her. Caroline was arguing with somebody. She was trying and failing to keep it to a whisper.

"What the hell was she thinking storming Klaus' mansion alone? Why didn't she call you or Stefan? Or me? Instead she sent me off to deal with Klaus!"

"I know, Care, I asked the same thing," Elena whispered back. "She had time enough to call you and Matt but couldn't call someone who could actually handle the situation?"

At that Bonnie had had enough.

"I did _actually handle the situation_ ," she croaked, and swallowed roughly. "I got him out, didn't I?" She sat up in the bed they had put her in.

Both girls spun around, realizing she was awake.

"Bonnie, oh thank god you're okay!" Caroline squealed. "You scared me to death! What were you thinking?"

Bonnie shrugged and started to climb from the bed. "How long was out for?" She was still tired so it couldn't have been too long.

"Half an hour," Elena answered. She was still standing in the doorway, watching her from across the room.

"How's he doing?" Bonnie asked her.

"He'll live."

Bonnie couldn't understand the whole monosyllabic thing she was doing and frankly didn't feel like deciphering it. She brushed past her friends and stepped out into the hall. She turned left and right, trying to get her bearings.

"To your right," Elena's soft raspy voice directed her.

Bonnie glanced back at her. "Thanks," she mumbled before heading off to find him.

Stefan had cleaned him up and got him into bed. His face was looking better already, but he was still unconscious.

"Stefan says he should wake up soon, if you want to get some more rest. You look exhausted, Bonnie," Elena commented.

"Well, it's been a long day." Bonnie sat on the edge of Damon's bed and put her face in her hands, rested her elbows on her knees. "I didn't call you Elena because I knew you would be upset. And I knew Stefan would go in like he was storming the castle. And I didn't think Damon had time for Stefan to fight through all of Klaus' hybrids." Bonnie looked up from the palms of her hands and dragged her fingers through her hair.

"Did Klaus do this?" Caroline asked. She was furious that Bonnie had sent her to placate the same monster that would do something like this.

"No. Rebecca." Her revelation was met with silence.

"How did you know where to find him?" Stefan asked this time. Bonnie glanced over her shoulder to see him sitting in a corner.

"I didn't even know to be looking for him," Bonnie admitted. "I thought he blew me off, we were supposed to meet at the Grille but he never showed. When I came out of the restaurant two of Klaus' hybrids came up to me and told me Klaus needed to see me. I told them to fuck off. They didn't like that, so they stuffed me in my own trunk and took me to him."

"What did Klaus want?" Elena moved to sit beside Bonnie, and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. Apparently all her previous hostility was forgotten.

"He made me unlink them all." Bonnie shook her head and tears slipped down her cheeks. "I didn't know what else to do. I had to."

"You did the right thing, Bonnie."

"No, I should've fought him or tricked him or something… I don't know. But I shouldn't have given him what he wanted."

"Well, you did what you had to."

 _Just like she always did,_ she thought to herself. "Anyway, after he released me, he was walking me out and that's when I saw him. He was uh... chained to the ceiling and it looked like she was trying to drain him dry…" she was having a hard time talking about it. She couldn't understand it herself, why she was so scared to see Damon so messed up like that. It had more than freaked her out, it completely disabled her.

She shook it from her mind, didn't want to think about it anymore.

"I had to get him out of there," she finished.

"Why didn't you call for backup before going back in, though?" Caroline pressed.

"I didn't need backup."

"See! That right there! That's what I'm talking about, the old Bonnie would never have gone running in after Damon without a plan and a backup plan! He's got you throwing yourself into dangerous situations!"

"Care, don't be ridiculous. Damon only wishes he had that much power over me." Bonnie was offended that her friend assumed she couldn't think for herself.

"It's not ridiculous to worry about you when you keep hanging around with a psychopath. Elena say something!"

"She's got a point Bonnie," Elena sided with Caroline.

"You have got to be fucking kidding me right now. Elena, you're sleeping with the goddamn Ripper of Monterey; and Caroline, you're busy falling for the Original fucking hybrid but y'all are mad at me because I saved _Damon's_ life? A year ago, you were begging me not to set him on fire!"

"I am NOT falling for Klaus! And I'm not even mad you saved him, although I personally wouldn't have cared if he'd died or not. What I'm mad about is that you risked your life to do it!" Caroline looked like she wanted to shake some sense into Bonnie.

"So I'm only supposed to risk my life to save yours? And Elena's? And Matt and Jeremy?" Bonnie was hot now. "Who else's life am I _allowed_ to risk mine for, Caroline? Since you seem to be making all of my decisions for me?"

"I'm not making decisions for you, I'm trying to make you see how bad your decisions have gotten!"

"They aren't your decisions to make!" Bonnie screamed.

"Bonnie," Stefan stepped in, trying to diffuse the situation. "We're all just concerned about your safety."

"No, because if you all were really concerned for my safety you would've noticed that I went missing for half a day before Klaus used me dry and then dismissed me, but where were you when _I needed you_? Huh Care?" Bonnie looked from her best friend to the other vampire. "And where were you Stefan when your brother was being tortured by Psycho Barbie for god only knows how long?" Nobody had anything to say to that, there was nothing they could say. "So don't you dare stand there and judge me for helping him. That's what I do, I help you people when you can't help your fucking selves… I would and have done so for every single one of you when none of you deserved it!"

They were all silently avoiding eye contact with her when they heard a low cough from the bed.

"Damn, for someone who's not even my friend that was one hell of a defense, witchy," he grinned and finally opened his eyes.

Elena shot forward to take his hand, her face a flood of relief that matched exactly how Bonnie felt. It only irritated Bonnie more.

"Fuck you, you asshole!" she yelled and stormed from the room.

…..

 _And if they lock us away_

 _Then I'll be still here_

 _Proudly waiting to kill more time with you…_

Damon found Bonnie a little while later, scrubbing at the bloodstains in the backseat of her Prius.

"Club soda works pretty good, too. F.Y.I," he suggested.

She looked over her shoulder at him but said nothing and returned to her task.

"Now you're not speaking to me?"

Bonnie didn't even bother to face him this time, "I think I've said quite enough for one evening."

"True," he nodded in agreement.

After she'd left the boarding house, Caroline had started in on him next, but he wasn't hearing it. Unlike Bonnie, he felt no need to defend his actions to anybody, least of all the freaking Brady Bunch. He blew them all off, downed a few bloodbags, chased them with some bourbon, cleaned himself up and went to find his witch.

 _His witch._ He wasn't sure when that had happened. One day she was setting him on fire, the next she was dragging him out of it. With no less animosity it seemed, but their whole dynamic had shifted when they weren't looking. It had caught him by surprise, so he could only imagine how Bonnie was taking it.

"Where's Little Gilbert? I half expected him to be here trying to talk some sense into you." Damon changed the subject and grabbed an extra sponge and dunked it in the bucket of soapy water at Bonnie's feet. He went around, opened her other back door and began scrubbing away at his blood.

Bonnie was almost amused at how spot on Damon could be sometimes.

"He came by," she answered vaguely.

"And…?"

"And I told him I didn't want to talk about it. Apparently Elena called him to come check on me." Her scrubbing increased in pressure as she thought about the encounter. "He told me that _he_ should have been the first person that I called."

"Of course he did. And what did you say?"

Bonnie huffed out a laugh, "Told him I was done pretending to give a shit what he thought."

"'Atta girl," he grinned.

"No, not 'atta girl', Damon," she stood up straight and looked at him over the roof of her car. "In the course of one night, I have managed to alienate myself from literally every single one of my friends."

Even in the dark he could read the disappointment on her face, saw that it was directed at herself.

"Not all of them," he promised.

 _We'll be outlaws_

 _Partners in crime_

 _We'll take on the world together_

 _I'm Bonnie you can be Clyde…._

 **a/n: leave me a comment. 'I'm an artist and I'm sensitive about my shit.' lol**

 **Bonnie is taking on a lot of Damon's habits but can you really say it's for the worse? I like seeing a Bonnie that will stand up for herself and demand the respect she deserves, even from the people she cares most about.**

 **Damon is still sweatin' Elena, he's old and stuck in his ways, but the more he points out faults in Jeremy to Bonnie, she dishes it right back about Elena. And nobody knows a girls faults like her best friend, right?**

 **Damon and Bonnie have grown closer, bonded. Bonnie still resists letting him all the way in because at the end of the day it is Damon and she's not stupid, but that won't be lasting much longer!**

 **-T.**


	4. Track 4- I'm Yours

**A/N: Here we go. Things get saucy towards the end...**

Track #4 - I'm Yours

...

 _Some nerve you have_

 _To break up my lonely_

 _And tell me you want me…_

"Dammit, Bonnie you need to make up with Caroline. I can't keep doing this shit."

"Did you get everything?" Bonnie dug through the grocery bags Damon had dumped in her lap.

"Yes, you now have enough ice cream and candy to send a normal person into a diabetic coma," Damon dropped into the couch next to her, jostling the textbook she had balanced on her lap. "I'm serious, Bonnie, if you don't call her today, then I will. This has to end."

"I don't know why you're being so dramatic, it was just a snack run," Bonnie pulled out a pint of strawberry cheesecake Ben & Jerry's ice cream and a pint of Cookies & Cream.

"I am not now, nor have I ever been an errand boy, Bonnie Bennett. This ends tonight," the threat in his voice was evident, Bonnie just wasn't sure what he threatening.

"Or what?" Bonnie grabbed a spoon and opened the strawberry ice cream. "You'll leave and never come back?"

"For starters," he replied. He watched her open the other carton of ice cream and take a spoonful out of it too before passing it to over to him. It was a very weird ritual he'd been forced to participate in twice before now and he still didn't quite understand the rules; something about spoon and spit etiquette…

"Damon you are free to leave at any time. I'll be just fine sitting here. All alone. It's not like a girl actually needs friends to share her ice cream with. I'll just eat it all by myself and like you said go into sugar coma from which I never wake up and then you'll be out a witch and won't have anyone to come to looking for you the next time you get kidnapped and tortured." She even ended her speech with puppy dog eyes and a pathetic sniffle.

"You're unbelievable, you know that. Guilt tripping me into doing your bidding? That's mighty low, even for you." Damon shook his head like he was somehow disappointed in her.

"Yeah well, apparently that's another bad decision to add to my long list of sins." Bonnie mumbled around a mouthful of ice cream.

"I'm sure that if you call her and talk to her you guys can work things out," Damon pleaded.

"Of course we would, but then she would think she won. She'd think she was right and I was in the wrong and I'm wasn't. I'm not."

"Please?" He begged. He even used her move and pulled out the puppy dog eyes, but apparently they didn't work in reverse.

"Is being my only remaining friend really that hard?" she asked. Her eyes were squinted and her head cocked to the side like she was warning him to tread lightly.

Damon knew that was a setup for more guilt tripping. He had learned by now to keep the complaining to minimum if he didn't want to hear how it was his fault her friends all hated her now.

Well, not all her friends.

Elena had sought Bonnie out the day after Damon's Not So Fun Night With Rebecca and the Subsequent Blowout. She had apologized for what happened between them and how she hadn't been there when Bonnie needed her.

Bonnie was almost ready to accept her apology and move on, but then of course Elena asked Bonnie if she had feelings for Damon.

The witch wanted so badly to say 'Yeah, I do. Does that bother you?' just to see what her friends reaction would be.

But instead she told her the truth, that no, her and Damon were just friends. Apparently, Elena wasn't buying it.

"It's just, you were so upset when you brought him in. You seem to really care about him…" Elena pried.

"Because we are friends…"

"I guess I don't understand when you two even became close. I thought you hated Damon."

"I don't know Elena," Bonnie sighed. She was so tired of defending herself to Elena. "Didn't you hate him when he snapped Jeremy's neck? And didn't you forgive him? Why is it so weird that I would do the same?"

Elena didn't know what to say to that, but Bonnie knew why it seemed so out of left field to her: Elena had forgiven Damon because she was in love with him.

"Look, I know that your feelings for Damon have changed and blurred and that things are complicated for you, but that is not the case between us. He's still an asshole, I still give him shit for being so screwed up and going after his brother's girl… but we have an understanding. He watches my back and I watch his. Plus he makes me laugh. And I've needed that lately."

"But you don't have feelings for him?" Elena asked again.

"Elena, do you hear yourself right now? You are with Stefan. Aren't you? Do you get how unfair you're being?" Bonnie couldn't believe she had to say this.

"I love Stefan, of course," she vowed.

"Then you need to stop worrying about who Damon is friends with. Or woman up and let Stefan know how you feel. Because you're only going to ruin them both if you keep this up."

Elena apologized again and left. Since then she had been polite and cordial towards Bonnie and avoiding Damon, but at least they were speaking. The same couldn't be said about Caroline.

They were in the radio silence stage of their fallout. Bonnie figured they both just needed time and space to cool off, but Damon wasn't taking it so well.

"You need your friends, Bonnie."  
"It's only been two weeks, Damon. Do you know that I didn't speak to Caroline for almost three months when she went out with Ryan McNab when she knew I liked him! Two weeks is nothing. It's practically a vacation." She stabbed her spoon into his ice cream.

"How is this a vacation when you're miserable everyday? And you're making me miserable! I just want to go back to when everyone happily hated me and only me, can we do that, please?" Damon opened a sleeve of oreo cookies and crumbled one into the strawberry ice cream.

Bonnie rolled her eyes; boys just didn't get it. It was the principle of the matter not the actual fighting. If Bonnie gave in now Caroline would think Bonnie missed her. And she did, but Caroline should miss her more.

"Damon, if I called her right now, she wouldn't even pick up," Bonnie tried to get him to understand.

"You don't know that, she probably misses you too."

"Even if she missed me more than I miss her, she wouldn't answer the call."

"Why not?"

"Because, then I'd have all the power."

"The power? Are you seriously telling me this is about a power struggle between you two?"

"Of course not!" Bonnie exclaimed, she didn't want him to think they were that petty… "But… essentially, yes."

"Call her," he demanded.

"She won't answer."

"Call her anyway."

Bonnie gave him an exasperated look and said, "Fine. I'll humor you." She plucked her phone from between the couch cushions and hit Caroline's number. "It's ringing," She informed him. "Still ringing. She's not gonna send it straight to voicemail, because that would be rude, but she'll pretend she was super busy with other things and didn't see that I called."

"How do you know she won't-" Damon was interrupted when Bonnie switched to speakerphone just in time for Caroline's outgoing message to kick in.

"Told you," Bonnie ended the call.

"But you could've left a message to call you back," Damon pressed, confused at everything happening right now. He was so far out of his depths with teenage girls.

"No need. Now that you've forced me to set things in motion ahead of schedule-" she glared at him before typing a message into her phone, "- I'll text her and tell her I want to meet up with her at the Grill tonight..."

"Great. Get dressed, I'll drive!" Damon bounced to his feet, ready to go.

"Don't bother," Bonnie went back to eating her ice cream. "She's gonna decline the invitation, and say she's busy right now but maybe tomorrow if she has time."

"How do you know what she's gonna say?" Damon asked.

"This is not my first rodeo. Caroline's been studying Sun Tzu's Art of War since before we started seventh grade. Now sit down, eat your ice cream, and watch it all unfold," Bonnie instructed.

"Fine, but I'm picking tonights movie. And it's gonna be bloody," he sighed. At least he had gotten things moving in the right direction. It was a start.

"I would expect nothing less from you, Damon," she faked a smile at him, and tucked herself into his side, getting comfortable.

…

 _How dare you march into my heart?_

 _Oh, how rude of you_

 _To ruin my miserable_

 _And tell me I'm beautiful…._

Two days later, Bonnie was more or less back to normal with her friends. They were all sitting around enjoying a late lunch at the Grille, catching each other up on what they'd missed in their lives. Bonnie had to admit that it was good to be with her friends again, but she was oddly distracted.

"Bon, you've checked your phone like ten times already, what's up with you? You got a hot date?" Care teased lightly, trying not to sound like she was prying.

"No, I'm just expecting a call, that's all," Bonnie brushed it off.

"Oh, a call from who?" Elena asked.

"Nobody, it's nothing," Bonnie quickly changed the subject. "How's Jeremy been? He's still avoiding me."

"As you could expect he's been mopey and sad. He misses you Bonnie," Elena pouted.

"You never really said why you broke up with him," said Caroline. "What happened?"

 _Crap,_ Bonnie thought, _so much for avoiding sensitive subjects._ "Things just didn't feel the same with us anymore. I couldn't keep pretending that I still felt the same about him." She hoped that was a good enough answer, she didn't want to get into details.

"Anyway, how about you and Tyler? How's he doing?" Bonnie asked Caroline.

"I wouldn't know. I haven't heard from him in months, not since Klaus ran him out of town…" Caroline launched into a monologue about how Klaus was ruining her life and she didn't know what would happen with her and Tyler in the future. Bonnie nodded and agreed at all the right places but she was barely listening.

Damon had walked in. Somehow Bonnie knew he was there without needing to look up and confirm it; she could feel his presence these days.

She also felt Elena straighten up and drag her fingers through her hair and wipe the grease from around her mouth; preening before Damon approached the table.

"Well, well, you ladies seem to be enjoying yourselves this fine afternoon. Everyone's looking so friendly again."

"Oh can it Damon," Caroline and Bonnie told him at the same time. They glanced at each other and smiled.

"What do you want? Or did you stop by with the sole purpose of annoying us?" Caroline asked while picking at her salad.

"Ouch, Care Bear," Damon slid into the booth next to her and rested his arm on the seat back behind her. "You wound me. Maybe I came by to bask in the beauty around this table," he nodded his head at Elena and winked at Bonnie.

She chuckled. She couldn't help it, she found him amusing, especially when Caroline looked like she wanted to stab him in the throat with her salad fork. "Dial it back there, Casanova before Care Bear decides to polish her fork with your eyeballs."

"Okay, fine. I may have found a lead on the Klaus Kick Rocks plan," he sat back and wiggled his eyebrows at Bonnie.

"What's the lead?" Elena asked.

"Well, my dearest Elena, I am so glad you asked," he smirked. "There's this ancient vampire here from out of town. Word is he's known Klaus practically since the stone age."

"And you think he'll have info on how to defeat Klaus?"

"Very good, Elena, ten points for you," he nudged her knee with his under the table as he teased her.

Bonnie rolled her eyes when her friend's face flushed red. "What makes you think he would share that info with you? If he's known Klaus that long and lived to tell the story, chances are he's loyal to Klaus. Loyal enough to kill anyone that comes to him looking for trouble."

"Well, Smarty Pants, if you have a better plan I'm all ears," Damon gave Bonnie the floor. She narrowed her eyes at the name he called her but otherwise ignored it.

"I just think you need to find out more about him, before you go in asking for favors. Find out the nature of his relationship with Klaus, whether or not they ended things on good terms... If they ended things at all. It's not like Klaus has friends, he has minions that are compelled to serve him. He could be a spy designed to lure Klaus' enemies in to eliminate any threats before they get to him."

Damon was pleased at how Bonnie had dissected the situation so easily, it should make the next part even easier. "Wow. Well, since you seem to have it all figured out, you won't mind riding shotgun. Come on Witchy , if we leave now we can be in DC tonight."

"D.C.?" Care repeated. "You want to take Bonnie to D.C, tonight? No way!"

Bonnie however was already pulling out her wallet to pay for her meal. "What do you mean no way? Care, if this gets us one step closer to being rid of Klaus, I'll do whatever it takes."

Care just looked at her friend with her jaw dropped. She shook her head and pressed her lips into a thin line, but didn't say anything more.

Elena also didn't want to start a fight, especially since they were finally speaking again. " Are you sure this is a good idea, Damon. This vampire is ancient, what if you need backup. Why don't you take Stefan instead?"

"Because Stefan would make a terrible date. And you don't have to worry about me, sweetheart. She is the backup," Damon tipped his chin at Bonnie and let her lead the way from the restaurant.

…

Damon was positive that he had come up with worse plans in his long, long life. Plans that had ended with him or his brother bleeding out on the side of the road or someone's heart being ripped from their chest, so this plan wasn't bad in the usual way his were bad.

No, this wasn't a _bad_ plan at all. He just hadn't considered all of the consequences of this plan.

When Bonnie stepped out of the hotel bathroom in a skin tight emerald green dress that hugged her curves down to her knees, Damon's eyes must have bugged out of his head.

"I look ridiculous, don't I? I can't pull off a dress like this…" Bonnie continued her self-conscious ranting and fussing over her dress, but Damon couldn't hear her while her hands were busy trying to tuck her breasts further into the dress to no avail. The dresses neckline dropped practically to her naval and barely covered her ample chest before tying behind her neck, leaving her shoulders, neck, and back bare.

"Damon? Damon! I said help me get out of this thing!" Bonnie was full on freaking out and ready to abort the whole plan.

Damon snapped out of it and swallowed the drool pooling in his mouth. His voice was slightly strangled when he finally responded, "Don't you dare take off that dress. Ever. You look phenomenal…"

"Really?" Bonnie must have heard something in his voice because she turned to face him, her eyebrows raised in surprise. "You don't think it's too much?" Her hands fluttered, smoothing the satin fabric over her flat stomach.

Damon took her hands to stop her fidgeting and she suddenly went still. His eyes roamed over her face. Her eye makeup was smokey and flawless but not overdone, it complimented her eyes and the highlights in her hair. Everything about her was glowing. It made Damon want to lick her and see if she tasted as warm as she looked...

"You look beautiful. Just…. don't change a thing."

Bonnie's face flushed and she looked down at her toes in her six inch heels, hiding her face behind her hair. "I'm probably gonna… fall on my face or my boobs are gonna pop out or something…"

Damon grinned down at her and gently pushed her hair back behind her shoulder. He saw her tremble slightly at his touch. It crossed his mind what other reactions she may have to him but he quickly pushed that thought away.

"You're gonna be fine, I won't let you fall." He promised. "Are you uh ready to go?" He blinked a few times, he was having trouble talking and thinking at the same time.

"No, I just need a minute," she softly cleared her throat and left him standing there as she disappeared into the bathroom.

Damon sighed and immediately crossed to the mini bar for a drink.

He definitely didn't think this plan all the way through.

…

Twenty minutes later Damon led Bonnie into a dimly lit ballroom filled with wealthy looking people.

Bonnie thought for sure she would look overdressed for the evening but she couldn't have been more wrong.

She tightened her grip on his arm and whispered, "I can't believe I let you talk me into this dress. I look like a hooker compared to every other woman here." She could feel eyes on her, judging her.

"No, you don't. You look sexy as hell," Damon assured her. "Or you would if you would stop fidgeting."

"People are staring at me," Bonnie said, and sure enough men and women were checking her out.

"That's because everyone in this room wants to fuck you," he mumbled under his breath. His hand streaked out and snagged a champagne flute from a passing server, "Here, hold this."

Bonnie gladly accepted the glass and drank half of it in one gulp. "Thanks, I needed that."

"Just focus on the mission. We are here to impress Amos and feel him out, get a sense for where his loyalties lie." Damon led them around the room. He was enjoying the envious looks he and his date were receiving.

"Right." Bonnie took a deep breath.

Damon had surprised her tonight when he had unzipped a garment bag and told her to go change. It was so like him to withhold pertinent information right up to the last possible second. Like the fact that they were crashing a gala in honor of some foreign dignitary and that it happened to be a black tie affair.

And when she stepped out of that bathroom and saw him there in his Brioni tux, hair slicked back and actually styled for once, and smelling like a million bucks- yeah, she hadn't been ready for that at all.

The way his eyes had glued to the parts of her that she was most self conscious of (breasts, hips, thighs) turned her into a blithering idiot. Suddenly she was super nervous- and not about the two thousand year old vampire they were meeting. She felt like he was burning holes in her dress and she kept patting herself checking for fires, that's how hot his gaze was.

She'd nearly melted when he caressed her face and brushed her long hair over her shoulder.

Bonnie had to spend a few minutes locked in the bathroom getting a handle on her hormones. She kept telling herself it was just a natural response to his cologne- they laced that stuff with pheromones these days!- and it was only Damon, it's not like he was going to try anything with her. And then she had to convince herself she wasn't disappointed at that thought.

So, by the time they actually entered the ballroom, Bonnie was a mess of nerves. She needed to focus on anything besides the fact that her skin burned everytime Damon laid a hand on her lower back or her shoulder. She wanted to tell him to knock it off but didn't want to draw any attention to the fact it affected her.

She distracted herself by sensing for any other supernaturals in the room. Besides herself and Damon she felt at least four other sources of energy that were beyond human.

"We've got company," she murmured into her champagne glass.

"Who?" his eyes covertly scanned the room.

"Two by the far door," she tilted her head in their direction, "one by the bar, and the bitch in red coming up on your six," Bonnie sighed.

Damon shot her a quizzical look before he turned and came face to face with none other than Katherine Pierce. He barely refrained from reaching out and wrapping a hand around her throat. "Katherine, what brings you out of hiding tonight?"

"Oh, Damon I missed you. It's so hard to find someone who will believe literally anything," Katherine turned her self-righteous gaze upon Bonnie. "Wow, Bonnie. Who knew the little witch was hiding such a body under all those clothes. Careful, Damon, you wouldn't want your 'date' to attract the wrong kind of attention."

"Katherine, I swear to god-" Bonnie barely managed to get her threat out before she was interrupted.

"Ooh, speaking of dates, mines looking for me- Yoo-hoo, over here!" she called across the room.

Damon and Bonnie looked to see who she was calling and saw a tall dark haired vampire with hard features and military regalia pinned to his tux.

They shared a glance and then turned back to the smug looking brunette.

"Amos is your date?" Damon said through clenched teeth.

"You know what they say- Keep the friends of your enemies close," she gave them a winning smile and sashayed back into the arms of the oldest vampire in the room.

"She was your lead, wasn't she? She the one who told you he'd be here?" Bonnie was furious with him for not sharing that bit of information.

"Yeah, however she failed to mention she would be attending the event as well," Damon grimaced at Bonnie's nails digging into his arm. "Relax, Judgey. I've got a plan."

"That is the least relaxing thing I have ever heard." Bonnie drained the last of her champagne and said a silent prayer for strength.

"Have some faith little bird, I got this. Stay here." He slid his arm from Bonnie's death grip and circled around the room to come up on Katherine from behind.

Bonnie watched as Damon 'accidently' bumped into Katherine and proceeded to gain an introduction to Amos. They chatted for a few moments before he glanced around like he was trying to find someone and then settled his eyes on her and waved her forward.

When Bonnie joined them, Damon once again set his hand on her lower back.

Before he could introduce her, Katherine beat him to the punch, saying "This must be the lovely fiancée you were telling me about."

Damon didn't even skip a beat, "Yes, this is the love of my life, Bonnie. Bonnie, I want you meet the guest of honor, Amos Legarian, and this is Katherine." Damon's hand squeezed her hip slightly, warning her to play along.

"Pleased to meet you both," she said politely.

"The pleasure is all mine, chérie," Amos greeted her with a kiss to her knuckles. Bonnie shivered when he touched her, felt that flash of death she got whenever she met new vampires. "You are an exquisite creature, you will save me a dance won't you?"

"I'd be delighted," she beamed.

"Marvelous. Will you excuse us a moment?" Amos excused himself and Katherine as they continued to make the rounds, shaking hands with nearly everyone in the room.

"Not a bad first impression, fiancée." Damon grinned at Bonnie. "You handled that well."

"Not like I had much of a choice, did I?" Bonnie rolled her eyes.

"Still, you might have just gotten us a second meeting." Damon pulled her onto the dance floor and began to rock her side to side.

"How do you mean?" Bonnie was trying desperately not to focus on the gentle way he held her and moved her body. Or how strong his arm felt around her or the way his thighs were rubbing against hers.

Damon chuckled, "Well, he sure as shit wasn't impressed with me. He was all ready to dismiss me like some peon until you walked up." Damon's eyes roamed over her face. "I'm fairly certain he wants more than a dance…"

"Jesus, Damon," Bonnie sighed and tried to step back out of his grasp but he wouldn't let her move an inch, only hugged her closer.

"Don't worry, Little Witch," he whispered in her ear. "I'm your fiancé not your pimp, remember."

Bonnie just shook her head at him. This was getting ridiculous. She didn't know when she had become so hyper aware of Damon but every time he took a breath and exhaled it danced across her neck and raised the hairs on her shoulders.

"Are you cold?" he asked her.

"No, why?" Bonnie made the mistake of looking up into his bright blue eyes. The heat she saw there sent a quiver down her spine.

"You're shivering… and you've got goosebumps," Damon trailed his fingertips up her back and over her shoulder watching her skin react.

"I guess I am... a little cold," she flat out lied. Actually she was burning up. His hand moved back down to rest on her bare back and she took a sharp breath and sighed.

She was trying to remember the last time a guy made her feel this tightly wound by barely even touching her. She didn't think she ever felt anything like this.. Like she couldn't get close enough but also wanted to run away and hide.

Damon was doing all he could to keep his feet moving and keep them twirling to the music. Every breath Bonnie took raised her chest against his and every time she exhaled it blew across his ear.

He heard every gasp she made when he moved his hands on her. Her skin was even softer than he thought it would be, he almost couldn't tell the satin of her dress from the silky feel of her naked back.

Her ridiculously high heels put her at the perfect height to just barely see over his shoulder, the perfect height for him to slide his thigh between her knees. His eyes drifted shut at the exquisite heat he found there….

"Damon, what are you doing," Bonnie asked him and his eyes snapped open.

"Uh dancing," he deflected. If he was being honest with himself he didn't have a clue anymore.

"I think I need to get some drink- drink some air- water a drink. Gah- I need a minute," Bonnie ripped from his hands and pushed through the crowd to the nearest restroom.

Damon ran a hand down his face and was surprised to find his hand damp.

 _What is that- sweat?_ he thought to himself. _I don't sweat._

What the hell was wrong with him? First she had his tongue glued to the roof of his mouth and now he was sweating? He was fucking losing it.

He quickly marched to the open bar and order a bourbon neat.

And if he wasn't mistaken Bonnie was in the same boat he was. He had never ever seen her so jumpy before, at least not around him. Well, not since before they had become friends.

 _Friends_. Damon focused on that word. Repeated it in his mind like a mantra. Bonnie was a friend, not food and certainly not a fuck.

But the way she looked tonight…

Damon tried to convince himself that he was just appreciating a beautiful woman. Like one might admire a work of art. That's why he couldn't take his eyes off her. He was just admiring a collection of assets. And Bonnie happened to have excellent assets. Her eyes were the color of jade. Her lips were wide and full and a decadent shade of purple, and he wondered if it tasted of berries. Her breasts were on display tonight, the straps of her dress covering the bare minimum to be considered decent. She had an ass that wouldn't quit, her dress barely contained it, and he just knew it would feel like pressing his cock into a cloud... And her legs; those legs were begging to be wrapped around someones waist, his waist, as he pound into her to tight wet puss…

 _Wait, that's too far, Damon. Get back to the friendzone._

He drained his third glass and was almost starting to regain his senses. Three more should just about do the trick.

"Oh, Damon, what happened?" Katherine had sidled up beside him while he was busy cataloging Bonnie's assets. "Did my body double finally give you the boot, good and proper? Are you banging her friend to make her jealous?" Katherine gasped like she was scandalized.

"I know it's hard for you recognize since you've never done it before, but me and Bonnie are strictly friends," he informed the wicked she-vampire. _(Bonnie is a friend, Bonnie is a friend, Bonnie is a friend…)_

"Damon you don't have to lie to me, I fully support using sex to get what you want. And hey, it doesn't hurt that Bonnie's hot as fuck either. I for one would definitely screw her over the blonde friend any day-too mouthy, am I right?"

She was, but he was never gonna tell it.

"Katherine what are you doing here with Amos?" Damon asked, deciding to cut the bullshit. "Doesn't he know Klaus has been trying to hunt you down for the last four hundred years?"

"He does, but he's not holding that against me. He knows Klaus has a bit of a temper and is often irrational about who he puts a bounty on," Katherine shrugged delicately. "Lucky little me I guess, that he wants to take pity on me."

"How do you know he's not keeping you close so he can hand you over to Klaus?" Damon said.

Katherine just smirked and stole his drink and tipped it to her lips. "Let's just say I'm keeping _him_ even closer so that he doesn't."

Damon shuddered and tried not to think about the implied sexual relationship.

"What are his ties to Klaus? Are they still chummy? Pen pals, what?"

"This whole gala is in his honor, not 200 miles from Klaus' last known base of operation, and yet Klaus didn't get an invite. What's that tell you?"

"That Amos may be in the market for a new best friend," Damon's smirk was rather smug.

"You're going to have to get in line. Looks like your gal pal is moving in on your target," Katherine subtly pointed out Bonnie across the room where she was standing way too close to Amos. His hand was on her waist and hers was on his upper arm as she leaned in to say something in his ear. Then he pulled back, laughing.

Damon's teeth clenched together. His eyes were burning and his hand closed in a fist, unfortunately his hand was also holding an empty glass which shattered immediately. "Shit!" He exclaimed.

"Jesus, Damon," Katherine laughed. "If I didn't know any better I'd think you were jealous."

"Katherine, don't make me kill you in front of all these people." Damon quickly cleaned up the mess and thanked the bartender for the towel he handed him, and left Katherine alone.

When he looked back in Amos' direction, the ancient vampire already had Bonnie on the dance floor, spinning her around in a waltz. Damon tried to read her face for any signs of distress or fear, but she seemed fine. Even cheerful. Like she was happy to be dancing in the arms of another man, what the fuck?

 _Friends_. That word again. Damon reminded himself that they weren't actually engaged to be married and he had no right to want to rip her away from him and it was probably just an act anyway, right. She was just completing the mission, and getting the information that they came for, she wasn't really enjoying the dance.

And what did it matter to him?

Damon shook his head. He realized his feet had carried him halfway across the room to where Bonnie and Amos were last standing. He halted his stride and took a breath. He'd been about to do something very stupid.

Damon changed course and headed straight back to the bar he came from.

Katherine handed him a drink.

"Shut up, Katherine," he growled.

She chuckled, "I said nothing."

Together they stood there and watched Bonnie work her magic until the song ended. Amos then led Bonnie over to Damon and very graciously placed her hand back in Damon's.

"You have found an exceptional woman here, Mr. Salvatore. I don't know how you can stand to be apart from her for even a moment."

"I manage," he answered, his eyes roving over Bonnie's face.

She glanced up at him and saw the stress on his features and her eyebrows puckered a bit, silently asking what his problem was. He blinked away his annoyance and plastered a smile on his face.

"Amos was just sharing a bit of his story with me. I'm willing to bet there's not enough time in the day for him to share them all," she beamed coyly at the older gentleman.

"And you would be right my dear. But when it comes to my old friend Niklaus there is only one thing you need to know. His family may be his only weakness, but even they could never stop him once he sets his sights on a prize. The best you can do is attract his attention elsewhere and pray he moves on." Amos' old world, strategist demeanor faded and the charmer returned. "Now, Damon, I think you should kiss your lovely fiancée and then take her back to the dance floor!"

"Yes, Damon, kiss your fiancée!" Katherine goaded gleefully.

"Uh-" Damon stuttered.

"He doesn't have to-" Bonnie jumped in.

But Katherine was determined, "What's the matter, you love her don't you?"

"I-"

"You said she was the love of your life, didn't you?" Katherine wouldn't let up.

"She is-"

"Then kiss the girl already!"

Damon knew he had no choice here. They were still selling a story.

Damon looked down at Bonnie and saw the fear in her eyes. His own widened, beseeching her to trust him. That this was only going to be a quick peck between friends and nothing more.

Bonnie looked back into his eyes and she realized that she does trust him, she trusts him with her life, she trusts that she will be safe with him. So she relaxes a bit…

Damon takes her face carefully in his hands, his thumbs brushed over her lower lip, before his lips take their place on hers.

And what should have been a quick peck suddenly wasn't enough. For either of them.

Bonnie sighed and sagged her weight into him, she brought her hand up to rest on his shoulder to steady herself.

Damon couldn't stop himself; his tongue pushed against her lips and when he met no resistance, his lips pushed hers open further and his tongue snaked out to tangle with hers.

Bonnie sighed again and turned her head to give him better access. She launched to her toes and pressed her body closer to his and Damon dropped a hand to her waist to hold her tight and Bonnie's tongue tasted so good and Damon was holding her just right and-

If he hadn't heard a throat clearing and soft raspy chuckles, he could have stood there all night. He pulled back first and watched Bonnie slowly open her eyes. He saw the reality of what just happened cross her face and he couldn't tell exactly how she felt about it. That almost bothered him as much as having to end the kiss. Almost.

"I think we've wasted quite enough of your time," Amos was saying. "You two have fun tonight. And Damon- Don't let that one slip away, she's a treasure."

"That she is." Damon replied. He watched her blush and shyly look down at her feet. He placed his fingers under her chin and tilted her face so she would look at him.

"So, what now?" she asked him.

Damon could think of a million things he wanted to do with her at that moment, not a single one of which would fit in the friend zone.

"I guess we should head home," he suggested lamely.

She dipped her head and then peeked at him again, "Is that all you want to do?" she asked so quietly he thought he misheard her.

He silent for one second too long. "Nevermind, I thought maybe you wanted another dance, but we can just go now, I heard they were also like, serving dinner or whatever, if maybe you'd wanted to stay but… you know what we _should_ go," Bonnie turned to march out the door with or without him, but Damon caught her wrist and pulled her back into him.

She was ready this time. Bonnie was on her toes before his lips were even close to her. She kissed him with everything she had been holding back all night, she let her lips and tongue tell him everything she couldn't say out loud.

She held onto him as tight as she could, like she was afraid he'd let go at any moment, before she had her fill of kissing him. She raked her fingers through his hair and Damon stiffened and pulled back, their kiss breaking with a smack.

"We need to move," Damon pushed her off of him and gently took her elbow to pull her from the ballroom. Bonnie could barely think straight let alone keep up with him as he practically dashed through the crowd.

"Why, what happened?" she asked, still breathless.

"You happened," he growled.

"Damon, slow down," she begged him.

They made it to the lobby of the hotel before Damon slowed his pace.

They stopped at the elevator and neither of them pushed the button, just stood there hand in hand, each one imagining what they'd do to the other once they were alone for fifteen floors. Bonnie looked at him again and saw that his face was flushed and he looked like he was concentrating very hard.

"Are you okay?" she whispered.

"Yeah."

"Damon?"

"Yes?"

"Hit the button," she told him. He was looking at her again with those Crystal blue eyes that were burning her up.

He reached out and smacked the button and before he could say anything else the doors opened and she stepped inside.

He followed her in quietly and stood behind her as she pressed the button with their floor on it.

She's holding herself so tightly now, aware of every step, every breath, every muscle he moves. She feels him slide up behind her and wrap an arm around her and lay his palm flat on her stomach. When he pulls her back into his chest she feels his rock hard embrace. Her head shifts back and then she feels his lips on her neck, softly blazing a trail of open mouthed kisses. She steps back and now her ass is resting right up against his crotch and he's already semi hard but growing and she finds it fascinating that it's her that causes that reaction in him. She grinds into him softly and he hisses out a breath and pushes his dick into her ass harder. She moans and pushes back because he feels so good the way he surrounds her, one hand drifting up to cup her breast and the other on her hip holding her steady and as he continues to stroke himself up and down her ass.

One of them has to say something, do something, stop this, before they go too far.

"Damon," she didn't mean to moan his name like that. She clears her throat and tries again, "Damon, stop."

He's busy working a hand up her dress and his fingers slide on the arousal he finds dripping down her inner thigh. It only makes him harder.

The elevator dings and the doors open and it's like Bonnie can breathe again. She scrambles out of his arms and pushes her dress back down. But she stops him with a hand on his chest, keeps him from leaving the elevator.

"You need to go back to the party," she said.

"I what?" Damon couldn't possibly have heard her right with all the blood rushing from his head to his dick.

"I… I'm gonna go change and pack and then we are going back to Mystic Falls, tonight," Bonnie said shakily.

"Bonnie we don't have to-" Damon started, but the elevator doors were closing on her.

She jumped out, "Just go Damon, please."

And like that she was gone.

 _'Cause I wasn't looking for love, no_

 _Nobody asked you to get me attached to you_

 _In fact you tricked me_

 _And I wasn't trying to fall in love but, (girl), you pushed me..._

 **A/N: Oh shit, Damon got curved. This chapter needs a follow up before the next song. So the next chapter's gonna be Track #4.5 (I'm so fucking yours) lol**


	5. Track 4-5 I'm Yours (too)

**As promised, here is 4.5. I needed to finish up I'm Yours before we move on... They needed to clear some things up anyway...**

 _So all that I'm asking_

 _Is that you handle me with caution_

 _'Cause I don't give myself often…_

The return trip to Mystic Falls was uneventful. On the outside, anyway.

It was after midnight when they hit the road but Bonnie still put her shades on and didn't take them off the entire trip.

Damon wasn't panicking or anything. If he'd learned anything from watching Bonnie's fight with Caroline it was that she needed time and space before she'd want to talk about what happened.

And he was fine with not talking about it. It wasn't like he needed to analyze what happened in that elevator. Or figure out if it would happen again. Or if she wanted it to happen again. Or if she wanted more and that's why she stopped them. Or if he wanted more too…

No he didn't need to talk about it at all. Instead, he cranked the music loud enough to drown out his thoughts and put pedal to metal, hauling ass back home.

As soon as the car stopped in her driveway, Bonnie was out the door and digging her bag out of the backseat.

When she straightened and closed the car door she saw him watching her over the roof of his car. "So, I'll uh- talk to you later, right?"

"Bonnie-" he began, but she stopped him.

"Don't Damon. Not tonight, alright. We have made it this far, so just do me a favor and just- sleep on it. Okay?" She begged of him and finally lowered her glasses so he could see her face. She didn't look angry or hurt, just tired, and tired he could deal with.

"I was just gonna say have a good night," he told her.

"Oh," she sighed and gave him an embarrassed smile. "Right. You too, Damon."

He watched her go up the steps to her porch before she turned back and hollered, "And thanks for the dress."

"Don't thank me, I'm returning it tomorrow!" He promised.

"Like hell! This baby's mine!" Bonnie finally graced him with a real smile before she stuck her tongue out at him and slammed the door.

"We'll see about that," he chuckled.

…

 _Cause I've had my heart_

 _Broken before_

 _And_ _I promised I would never let me hurt anymore..._

Bonnie spent the following week avoiding Damon whenever she could. She talked to him and they joked whenever they ran into each other at the Grille or Elena's, but that was it. She kept it light, traded a few quips, made note of the weather and who died last night, and then quickly left.

She was still trying to work out how she felt about that kiss.

That night after the gala, Bonnie lay awake thinking about it and reliving it in her head over and over. She was about fifty percent sure it wasn't just a hot daydream she had.

It just didn't make sense. It wasn't adding up to her. How could her and Damon go from being super platonic best buddies to him dry humping her in an elevator?

The more she thought about it she kept coming back to one conclusion: the dress.

The dress made him do it. It was too sexy. Bonnie had never worn a dress like that one before in her life, so she had no idea men would respond the way Damon did. It was lust, plain and simple.

But Cinderella was back from the ball and the dress and shoes were hanging in the back of her closet and things could go back to normal now…

Except…

The dress explained Damon's behavior… but did it explain hers as well?

Maybe the dress made her feel sexy, she reasoned with herself. And that made her open and susceptible to Damon's unmasked attraction.

By morning she had decided that this whole thing was all his fault. He dragged her on another useless research mission. He picked out the dress for her and the fuck me pumps. He's the one who couldn't control himself! If he had just left her alone, none of this would have happened and she wouldn't be stuck avoiding another good friend.

Bonnie decided to do Damon a favor and let him off the hook. She could just forget the whole thing ever happened and try to go back to being just friends. They never had to talk about it. Ever.

And that plan almost worked for her. She was all geared up to go back to being friends- but when Damon texted her later the following day to see if she wanted to get food, she found she couldn't respond. She didn't know what to say or how to say it and by the time she came up with something, more than an hour had passed and her window was gone. Now it would look like she was avoiding him. So she just never responded. Crawled under her covers and said screw it.

The next day was similar. She pumped herself up to go out and be the best friend she knew she could be and when she ran into Damon and Stefan at the Grille after school she played it so cool she came off like a total asshole. Like she didn't have the time of day to sit and talk to him for five minutes! That wasn't the plan at all, she wasn't intentionally blowing him off, she was trying to make things right but she was ruining it. She left the Grille hungry, didn't even stay to order food, she was so embarrassed.

Day three she was dealing with actual drama of the Mikaelson variety. Not Klaus, but Esther. She was intent on having Bonnie kill her children. She more or less kidnapped Bonnie to fill her in on her plan. Bonnie was out of cell range for hours since the Original Witch felt it necessary to drag her out to the woods to talk.

When she made it back to town her cell showed she had two missed calls from Damon. Bonnie sent him a lame apology text explaining that she hadn't seen he called till now. He didn't respond to that and she couldn't blame him.

But she did have to call a meeting of the minds to deal with the Esther situation.

Bonnie stopped at Elena's house, not even thinking of Jeremy when she rang the bell and was surprised when he showed up at the door.

It was every bit the awkward encounter she was avoiding. He hugged her and told her he missed her and she looked good and blah blah blah.

Bonnie made small talk until Elena came in from the kitchen and saved her.

"Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!" she exclaimed once they were alone in her room. "I don't think he would have let me leave if you hadn't showed up when you did."

Elena smirked, "He wants you back Bonnie, he's going to keep trying."

"It's not gonna happen. You should tell him that," Bonnie said.

"I've tried but he won't believe me. He thinks you guys are meant to be."

"I can't deal with him today. I came to tell you about something else." She filled Elena in on what Esther was planning and they talked a while and Elena said she was on her way to see Stefan, might as well fill him in. She offered to give Bonnie a ride over to the boarding house, but Bonnie claimed she had an errand to run and told Elena to call her with details.

Elena didn't think anything of it until she got to the boarding house and Damon grilled her about why Bonnie wasn't delivering this news herself.

"She said she had errands to run and couldn't come, what's the big deal?"

"It's no big deal," he ran a hand over his hair. "Tell me what she wants to do about Esther again."

And so the week went on like this until Damon decided he'd had enough of playing phone tag with the witch. They had actual business to handle and he needed her to get her shit together and actually talk to him.

 _I'm mad at you_

 _For being so cute_

 _And changing my mood_

 _And altering my rude_

 _What's wrong with you?_

He tracked her down on Saturday morning but when he arrived at her house she wouldn't answer the door.

He figured he had two options here; break the door down and force her to her look him in the face, or he could try again later.

No, he was tired of later.

He let himself in, half expecting to find her hiding behind the door, but she wasn't there. He called to her upstairs and got no response, he searched the kitchen and found nothing.

He was ready to leave when he heard a hum from outside in the backyard. He pushed his hearing further and heard her soft singing. He stepped out the backdoor and found her.

He watched her a moment as she kneeled in her garden, fingers sunk deep into the earth, earbuds nestled in her ears.

 _Now or never,_ he thought before he went and stood over her.

Bonnie jumped and screamed at his shadow, fell to her butt. When she saw it was him her reaction wasn't much better.

"What's wrong Bonnie? You look like you've seen a ghost," he kept his face neutral, he would give nothing away, just like she had given him nothing all week.

"What the hell, Damon? You scared the crap outta me!" Bonnie stood up to brush dirt off her knees and backside. Damon found it a little harder to remain impassive when he saw she was wearing cutoff shorts and a tank top that had to be at least two sizes too small. _Eyes up,_ he told himself.

"What are you doing here?" she asked.

"Well, apparently I have to hunt you down and break into your house if I want to see you. You've had a whole week to avoid me, and play your war games, but now I'm done playing."

"I haven't been playing any games, Damon. It's just been a weird week," she was having trouble looking him in the face. He looked good today. His dark henley was pushed up his forearms and his jeans were just right and … Okay, Bonnie thought, he looks the exact same as always, but somehow different.

"Tell me about it," Damon said. When she didn't respond he continued, "No, I mean actually tell me about your week. Because I used to talk to you every day before and now I have to find out that you were kidnapped by the Original Bitch Witch secondhand! What gives?" If he could just focus on how mad he made her he could get through this. He wouldn't be tempted to wipe at that smudge of dirt on her shoulder…

Okay, she guessed they were done ignoring the elephant in the room. "What happened between us…" she paused trying to find the right words to begin.

"We kissed," Damon supplied helpfully.

"Yeah no, we more than kissed," Bonnie was blushing now just thinking about the elevator. "If it had been just a kiss maybe I could handle that, but it's the 'more than a kiss' that I keep getting hung up on."

"Yeah," Damon agreed. He'd been thinking about what could've happened in that elevator all week. "But you stopped us from going any further…"

"I did," she bobbed her head.

Damon stared at her hard, eyebrows raised, not wanting to verbally ask why.

"Because I had to," Bonnie gave up on trying to look at him without wanting to touch him. She went back to kneeling at the edge of her garden. But Damon wasn't letting her off so easy; he sat on his butt right beside her.

"You weren't into it?" he asked lowly, trying not to let that bother him.

"It's not that," she told him. "Did you really think I wasn't into it?"

"Don't know what to think since you won't even look at me…" he hinted.

She turned her head to look at him dead on, just to prove him wrong like he knew she would. He quickly put his hand on her cheek to keep her there where he could see her. He heard her heart speed up and her reaction pleased him.

"You've got to give me something here, Bon. Tell me what you're thinking, anything, please," he even added a smile so it wouldn't sound quite so much like he was begging.

Oh god that smile! Since when does his smile make her feel this way? She tried to pull her face from his grip but he wasn't having it. She sighed and asked the first thing that came to mind, "Were _you_ really into it?"

"Me? Was I-? I was-" he stammered. He took a breath, "How can you think I wasn't really into it?"

"That's not an answer," she batted his hand away and this time he let her go.

"Well, I thought it was pretty clear how into it I was," he smirked. "If you hadn't stopped me when you did I would have shown you just how _deep into it_ I can get…"

Bonnie giggled at that and covered her eyes. "Ohmygod, that is not what I mean." But it was good to have her suspicion confirmed: if she hadn't stopped him they definitely would have fucked.

Damon was glad to see her laugh, but he was being dead serious. "Then what do you mean?"

"I mean, were you really into it with _me?_ "

"I wasn't on that elevator with anybody else, was I?" He couldn't understand what she was asking.

She sensed he was frustrated with her obscure line of questioning. She had to be frank, "What made you kiss me? And I don't mean Katherine and her shenanigans, I mean the way you kissed me… Why did you kiss the second time? " She peeked over at him and watched him run his tongue over his lips like he could still taste her there. Her stomach clenched, _D_ _amn that was hot._

"It just... felt right," he shrugged. "I wanted to."

"Right, but why then? Why that night and not two nights before? Or any other time we've hung out in the past two months?"

He didn't answer that. He finally had a clue as to where her questions were leading.

"I'll tell you why, Damon. Because of that damn dress!"

"Okay, you lost me again. You're saying the dress made me kiss you?"

"Yes! And it made me kiss you back, and that whole elevator thing wouldn't have happened if not for that dress," she concluded.

"That's some...interesting logic you got there Bennett, you wanna break that down for me?"

"Come on, Damon. That dress was hot. I was like, smokin' hot in that dress. And you had a physical and chemical reaction to seeing me in that smoking hot dress. And I had a physical and chemical reaction to your reaction."

Damon just blinked at her.

"Ergo," she continued, "It wasn't even up to either of us. It was the dress. And lust."

Damon nodded his head like he was following what she was telling him.

"And maybe the shoes," she added, "'cause they were really hot, too. So. Yeah." Bonnie waited for him to respond or agree or thank her for coming up with the answer as to why they had lost their minds the other night and almost slept together… but he was very still and very quiet as he studied her.

"Damon?"

"No."

"No? What do you mean, no?"

"I mean, okay. Yeah, you were smoking hot in that dress, but no, I'm not buying the 'my dress made me do it' excuse."

"Why not?" She was a little miffed that he was poking holes in her theory.

"Because Bonnie. You're sitting there in shorts and a tank, covered in dirt, barefoot, and I keep thinking how good that dirt would taste if I licked it off of you!" He was yelling by the time he finished.

Now Bonnie sat blinking at him. "'You want to lick the dirt off of me?'" she asked to clarify if she had heard that right.

"I know it sounds crazy, it is crazy," Damon admitted. "But it's not just the sexy outfit. That I picked out because I have uh-mazing taste, you're welcome by the way." she grinned and rolled her eyes. "You're right, that night may have been the first time I saw sexy Bonnie, but it's not the first time I've been attracted to you. It was just the first time I said fuck the friend zone. The first time I got to hold you in my arms and slow dance with you. The first time I felt the way your body responded to my touch." He ghosted his fingers over her shoulder as if needing to confirm his statement, and sure enough she shivered and broke out in goosebumps in the midst of the hot summer morning. He heard her heart race again, heard her sharp intake of breath. "The first time I stopped pretending I only saw you as a friend."

Bonnie found it hard to speak around the crashing of her heart. This had taken a sharp turn for the surreal. She had prepared a lot of speeches for when they finally had this talk, but none of them were made for this outcome.

"So what are you saying?" she asked him.

He shrugged. He had just told he wanted to lick dirt off her body, that wasn't clear enough?

Screw it. He leaned in and captured her face, watched her eyes widen, listened as her heartbeat sped up yet again. He barely touched his lips to hers, he was being so careful not to scare her away.

When Damon kissed her the world slowly melted down to nothing. He was so soft. How can he be that soft, he's a vampire! But he softly kissed her bottom lip, softly pulled on it with his own.

She couldn't not explore his lips back; she sucked on his upper lip and sighed. It was better than she remembered. She felt like all week she had been waiting for this. She was a little pissed at herself for avoiding him so long.

Her head shifted and her tongue slipped out to taste his lips and Damon tried to let her lead. Let her do what she wanted, but she was too slow. The hand not holding her face gripped her knee and slid up to her waist and he pulled her closer. Her hands landed on his chest and worked up to his neck where she held onto him. Her lips and tongue were fire and cinnamon and he couldn't get enough.

She gasped for air and his lips moved to her cheek and chin, tasting as much of her as he could.

Holy shit, he tastes so good. She was already wetter than a slip 'n slide and they were only kissing.

"See? Not the dress," he rested his forehead against hers, pecking her lips here and there.

"You're sure it wasn't the shoes?" she grinned and kissed him again.

He chuckled, "They were great shoes." _(_ _You make me sick for being so perfect What did I do? What can I do, oh?)_

As much as she was enjoying his lips she had a couple questions for him.

 _'_ _Cause I've had my heart_

 _Broken before_

 _And I promised I would never let me hurt anymore…_

She wasn't sure what this meant for them. He said he saw her as more than a friend, but that didn't necessarily mean he wanted to date her. And if they started sleeping together could they remain friends like they had been? She didn't see how they could avoid it now that she knew how they felt about each other. But then again, attraction didn't mean he was in love or anything. And how _did_ she feel?

"Damon," she whispered.

He recognized that sigh. And it wasn't a good one.

He stopped kissing her neck and looked up into her bright jade eyes. She looked like she was ready to talk some more.

"Yep, there it is."

"There what is?"

"You're all freaked out now and about to run from me like a chicken."

"Hey, I do not run like a chicken!" She interpreted the look he gave her as him calling bullshit. "Okay that was me trying to take control of the situation before things escalated. I'm not running chicken."

"Sure…"

"I just want to to know what I'm walking into," she reasoned.

He sighed and let go of her altogether. He leaned back and stretched out in the grass, his arms folded under his head.

Bonnie lay back next to him, close but not touching.

He could tell her he just wanted to be with her, and however they could make that happen he was good with it. But that wasn't entirely true.

"You know, I saw you the other day, having dinner with the quarterback…"

"Okay… And? You didn't come say anything."

"I couldn't. I probably would've broken his face if I had," he admitted sourly.

"Why? What did he do?" Bonnie looked over at him.

"Nothing. He was just sitting there, making you laugh and blush, and stealing your fries. But I wanted to murder him in that moment. I almost vamped out on the spot, I was so furious," he could feel the rage rising again just thinking about it. "What was so damn funny anyway?"

"You were furious that I was talking to Matt?" she ignored his question.

Damon rolled his eyes, "I was furious that another guy was sitting in my seat, eating my fries. Okay, not _my_ fries, but you know what I mean."

"Are you trying to tell me you were jealous?" she gasped.

"No, I was just mad!"

"Mad 'cause you were jealous," she teased him.

He looked at her trying not to laugh at him out right. "The point is, I didn't like it. I don't like thinking about you with another guy."

Bonnie wasn't sure what to say to that. It oddly made her feel good to know that he wanted to punch Matt's light out. It made her feel special. She tried to think what she would have done in the same situation.

"Elena asked me what was up with you this week. She said you were being weird.

"I haven't even talked to Elena this week. Except to learn that you were kidnapped again," he glared at her. "Don't think we aren't gonna circle back to that."

"Well, that's my point. She told me you weren't talking to her and I was happy about that. I think I liked knowing you weren't thinking about her, because just maybe you were thinking about me." She hadn't realized it at the time, or hadn't wanted to explore it deeper, but it was true.

"I was thinking about you. All week." He opened his arm and she wiggled closer to rest her head on his bicep.

"I really tried not to. That's why I'm out here playing in the dirt, trying to distract myself. Like I know anything about gardening."

"Yeah, what were you doing? Since when do you garden?"

"I don't! Not yet anyway. But I had to do something, I couldn't spend another day in that house daydreaming about elevators…"

"Hmmm," he purred. He rolled to his side and looked down at her, "Sounds oddly similar to how I spent my week."

"Really?" She wanted to so badly to believe him. Believe he wanted this like she wanted this.

"Yep."

And when he pressed a kiss to the crown of her head, she felt it again. That safety she felt right before their first kiss.

"Can I tell you something?" she murmured into his chest.

"Sure," he said warily.

"I don't think I can take another heartbreak…" she whispered. "You already know what I gave to Jeremy and how that turned out, but I can't do that again."

Damon didn't want to say anything rash. So he spoke slowly, so she would know he meant it. "First off, I am not Jeremy. He is an absolute idiot for cheating on you. I am an absolute idiot in my rights, so don't compare me to Gilbert."

"But-"

"And I can't promise not to break your heart, just like you can't promise not to break mine. We don't know what's going to happen. But I'm willing to chance it. If you are?"

He was asking her to trust him, and she could admit she's got her issues with that concept. The guys in her past haven't exactly left her with the best impression of relationships.

 _Oh, I used to be so used to boys just using me_

 _For you to be you to me_

 _Feels new to me..._

But Damon was different. He was always straight with her, to the point she wished he would keep some things to himself.

So, could she do the same? Be just as honest with him?

 _And I wasn't trying_

 _To melt this heart of iron_

 _But the way you hold me makes the old me pass away_

 _And I would be lying_

 _If I said I wasn't scared to fall again..._

"Neither of us has a great track record of relationships, huh?" she smirked.

"That probably means this is terrible idea," he smirked right back. "Blondie definitely wouldn't approve…" he goaded, knowing she didn't like being told what not to do.

"Well, in that case…" she rolled on top of him and sealed it with a kiss.

 _But I tore down my walls_

 _And opened my doors_

 _And made room for one_

 _So, baby, I'm yours…_

 **A/N: Aww! They are gonna work things out after all! If you've listened to the album, by now you may guess what happens next. I'll give you a hint: those pink walls aren't referring to just Bonnie's bedroom…**


	6. Track 5- Four Pink Walls

**A/N: Sorry for the long break between updates, this chapter was… well you'll see. Thank you so much for reading and reviewing each chapter. Each one is gold and I read them all, repeatedly to stay motivated to finish this one quickly.**

 **Warning NSFW…**

Track 5- Four Pink Walls

 _I grew up memorizing all the cracks in the wall_

 _Staring up at the ceiling watching particles fall_

 _See I prayed every day for a change to be made_

 _And I'd wait to be saved…_

They moved things inside to the air conditioned kitchen while she made lunch and they tried to sort out the details of their new arrangement. Bonnie was nothing if not pragmatic.

"You know what I hate? Those couples that can't go twenty-four hours without talking to each other. It's like, just because you're together doesn't mean you have to know every detail of your significant others lives, does it?"

"I agree. I mean, I would at least like to hear from you once a day, just so I know that you haven't been kidnapped again," Bonnie winked at him from where she stood at the stove making grilled cheese sandwiches.

"Oh, don't you start on _me_ being kidnapped, Little Miss Witchy. You still have some explaining to do about your encounter with Mama Mikaelson…?"

Bonnie shrugged a shoulder as if to say she was over it. "She cornered me at the drug store, I got in her car, she drove me to the woods. And at least when I get kidnapped people are nice enough to not torture me," Bonnie served him a 'ha, so there' face.

"Okay, that means nothing. I, however,manage to get kidnapped and tortured and still escape, all the time."

"' _Escape?'_ I think you mean rescued. As in I'm the one who rescues you all the time."

"Okay, new rule: you can't destroy my ego multiple times in one conversation."

Bonnie laughed, "Aww, poor baby. Does your ego need stroking?" Bonnie wrapped her arms around his neck and stood between his legs.

"Yes. Are you gonna stroke it for me?" He asked, his voice dripping in innuendo and his hands gripping the back of her thighs.

Bonnie tipped his chin up and kissed his lips and then replied, "Maybe, if you're a good boy."

Damon was getting a kick out Bonnies idea dirty talk. They'd have to work on it.

"Oh, I can be very good," he promised.

She kissed his earlobe and whispered, "I'll be the judge of that."

Damon was intrigued at that, but Bonnie left him hanging to go flip her sandwiches.

"Ok, so what else? What are we calling this?"

"I don't like labels," Damon replied.

"So then you don't have to call it anything. But what should I call it?"

"Why do we have to call it anything?" He whined.

"Okay, fine. Say I'm sitting next to you at the bar at the Grille and a guy comes up to talk to me. I tell him no thank you, because I'm in a…" she left the sentence open ended for him to fill in the blank.

"You don't have to say anything, I'll just rip his heart from his chest. Problem solved. Next question."

"Problem not solved. You can't rip the heart out of every guy that tries to talk to me!"

"Why not? And how many guys are out there hitting on you, Bonnie?" He knew she was beautiful, he just hadn't considered the fact that now he had to protect what was his.

"It's not like it's a lot, calm down. I'm just saying, occasionally, people- guys- do try to start a conversation with me for the purpose of getting my phone number. It happens," she shrugged. Her back was to him so she couldn't see his eyes flash red for a second.

"How many boys actually managed to get your number?" His voice changed, all trace of teasing was gone. She looked at him over her shoulder and smiled.

"Ballpark?" He barked, close to losing it as he imagined all the guys he would have to hospitalize for even looking Bonnie's way.

She turned to him, hearing the stress in his tone. "Are you serious right now? You want to do the exes talk? Because I don't. The past is in the past and it will stay there as long I'm your- whatever. Besides, you already know about everybody that matters," the last part she mumbled under her breath.

"What does that mean?"

She tossed her spatula in the sink, "It means I've only slept with one guy. Feel better now?"

Damon realized he was behaving badly and tried to veer back on course. "Fine, fine, fine. But... can we call it a Freaky Friendship?"

It worked, he had her laughing again, "We aren't getting freaky yet."

"Yeah, but I mean come on," he gestured up and down his body, "How long do you really think you're gonna hold out on all of this?"

"Longer than you think if you go around calling it a Freaky Friendship."

"Who do you think I'm going around telling exactly?"

"Ooh good point. I don't think we should."

"Should what? Tell people?"

"Yeah."

"Why, Miss Bennett, do you plan on keeping me your dirty little secret?" He mocked her in his debutante voice.

"Would it be bad if I said yes?"

"Would it be bad if I said I liked dirty little secrets?"

"Wouldn't be shocking."

"Well, there you go. Settled. You are really good at this, you deserve a reward. You should take off your clothes and let me ravage you," he suggested, eyebrows wiggling away at her.

"Or you could take out the trash for me?" she countered. "You know, there may be something to this Freaky Friendship thing after all."

Damon tied the bag and had it outside before she could even set their empty plates in the sink.

"Ha, jokes on you. I would've done it even if you weren't my Freaky Friend."

"Careful, there's still time to change my mind," she said as she rinsed their dishes clean.

"Nope, you've got your hooks in me now. I'm not going anywhere."

Bonnie turned and found him right behind her. He placed his hands on either side of her and boxed her in. She studied the grin on his face and how it stretched up to his eyes and made them crinkle and shine. It wasn't a grin she had ever seen him wear before and she decided she wanted to remember that goofy little grin.

"I believe you. Now close your eyes," she commanded.

He did so eagerly, "Oooh, are we starting freaky time?"

Bonnie snorted and pulled her phone out, opened her camera, "Not if you're gonna call it Freaky Time." She pecked his cheek and his grin widened into a full blown smile. "Open 'em."

 _Snap._

…

 _Up at night, hiding under covers found my escape_

 _Shut my eyes and let the bass buzz into my brain…_

The rest of the day was spent with Bonnie and Damon cuddled on her couch, intermittently fooling around and trying solve the Founders Council murders. Admittedly, the homicide investigation wasn't their top priority.

The fooling around was getting hotter and hotter and Bonnie knew she would cave in a day or two tops if not an hour.

That night Bonnie lie awake thinking of how she wanted their first time to go. She didn't actually want them to do it in an elevator, not the first time anyway. No, it should be special. And she could do special.

Bonnie decided to go old school and ask Damon over to watch a movie. So, she lit candles, set out ice cream that he actually did like, picked a movie she had no intention of watching, and poured wine.

Fifteen minutes later she refreshed her wine glass, checked her lipstick and her outfit- a simple black halter dress that had nothing on the green dress but it stretched tight in all the right places.

She turned on some music while she was waiting, testing out a playlist she had created earlier called F.F.T. for Freaky Fun Time.

By eight o'clock he was half an hour late and Bonnie was tempted to call him. She didn't want to seem like a shrew, though, so she decided to give him a little while longer.

She went through a few of her warm stretches from cheer practice; she wanted to limber up because as late as he was now and as horny as she had gotten, she was sure to jump him before he made it through the door.

 _Freaky Friends indeed,_ she thought to herself.

But an hour passed and he still didn't show. Both her candles and her patience had burned low.

She sent him three text messages: _Where are u?_ was the first. And when that went unanswered: _Are you still coming over?_ And finally: _I guess I'm going to bed alone tonight._

Not even five minutes after that last text, her doorbell rang.

Bonnie was so tempted to not even answer it, but she wanted to know what kind of an excuse he would have for standing her up.

When she opened the door, he leaned in to kiss her and she turned her head, giving him her cheek instead.

"Ooh, you seem mad," he observed.

"No shit, what gave it away," she left the door open and walked back into the house, leaving Damon to invite himself in and close the door behind him.

Bonnie was walking back into the living room from the kitchen with a trash can in hand.

"How was _your_ night?" she asked and threw the melted Butter Pecan ice cream in the trash with a loud thunk.

"Good," he answered slowly. "Ric was at the Grille for a while and we lost track of time."

"Wow, that's really too bad," she dropped the other pint of ice cream, Red Velvet cake, in the trash with another thunk.

"Why are you throwing away good ice cream?" Damon asked her.

"Because it's been sitting out for two hours. It's completely melted. It's no good anymore," she hissed.

"Did you want more ice cream?" he implored.

She set the can down roughly, "No, Damon, I don't want more ice cream. I want to know why you stood me up tonight!"

"I know I'm late but-"

"No, you're not just late. You missed it entirely!"

"Missed what?"

"Our date!"

"We had a date?" Damon was utterly bewildered. He felt like he was missing key information.

"No, we didn't Damon, cause you didn't bother to show up for it." She grabbed the nearly empty wine bottle and trash can and returned to the kitchen.

"Wait. When you asked if I wanted to watch a movie tonight, that was you asking me out?"

Bonnie's eyes nearly bugged out of her head, "Yes! What did you think it was?"

"Honestly, Bonnie I thought it was a group thing! I thought you had Caroline and Elena here tonight."

"Great. That's just great." Now instead of feeling like setting something on fire, she wanted to cry. She was humiliated.

She left Damon in the kitchen as she gathered the remnants of her attempt at romance.

Damon stopped her frenzied cleaning and made her stand still for a moment.

She pinched her lips together to keep her chin from wobbling.

"Hey, no, don't do that! Talk to me, tell me what's wrong?" Damon begged her.

Bonnie shook her head, she couldn't speak yet, her emotions were spilling out of control.

"This is because I missed your date- our date?" Damon ran his hands up and down her arms trying to calm her. He was starting to get just how much effort she had put into the night for him; now he really felt like a jackass.

"I'm so sorry I misread your message, I wasn't thinking. And yeah I was late on purpose, but only because I thought I was skipping movie night with the girls. Not because I was blowing you off."

She shrugged out of his hands and plopped down on the couch.

"Damon," her voice was stronger now but she didn't even know what to say.

"Just tell me how to fix it and I will. I will go out and get more ice cream. And- and more wine. And we will watch the movie, okay?" He was kneeling in front of her now.

"Ohmygod It's not about the movie!" she shouted at the ceiling.

"Then why are you so upset?!"

 _Because I was trying to screw tonight and you ruined it!_

She looked at him a moment and wondered if maybe he was just that dense. Maybe he really didn't put it together.

"You've never heard of Netflix and Chill?" she asked.

"Netflix and-" his jaw dropped open and his eyebrows skyrocketed to his hairline. He gave her a full body scan for what must have been the first time since he walked in. He looked at the scented candles on the coffee table with the wax still drying, the empty wine glasses.

Oh god. He was such an idiot.

"You were going to seduce me?" She nodded her head and her face scrunched up again.

"Don't cry, why are you crying?" Damon pulled her hands from her face.

"Because I can't even seduce someone who's supposed to be my Freaky Friend," she sighed. She was hopeless. She didn't know why Damon wanted her in the first place. "And I ruined our first time cause I couldn't just call and ask you over like a normal human being."

"No, no. this one is on me. A normal human being would've just come when his girl asked him to. Bonnie, I'm so sorry."

"It's fine Damon. I'm a little drunk and I worked myself up." She had calmed down significantly and was exhausted. "I'm just tired now."

Damon settled next to her in the corner of the couch so she could stretch out, her dress rode up her thigh a little.

Damon pulled the blanket off the back of the couch and threw it over her.

His fingers stroked down her arm and-

"Nope! Now start the movie."

He sighed and pressed play.

…

Two hours later, Pretty Woman was scrolling through the end credits and Damon was itching to set the night back on track. He'd spent the entire movie trying to be good and leave Bonnie alone, but he kept thinking back to how her face crumpled when she realized how clueless he was. He was on day two of their… arrangement and already in the dog house; that had to be some kind of a record.

Bonnie fell asleep before the opening credits even ended, but she woke up for her favorite parts, namely the scene on the hotels piano. She tried not to squirm against Damon but she knew he knew she was awake. He probably knew she was horny too, he just wasn't saying anything. He was going to make them sit through the entire movie to make up for missing their date.

She went back to sleep and woke up just in time for the fire escape ending.

She sighed at their happily ever after and wondered if her guy would ever get a clue like that. She didn't want to get her hopes up, he could barely manage to get the concept of 'movie night'.

Damon had shifted lower on the couch so that he was lying next to her now and she was pressed against the couch back.

"Are you gonna talk to me now?" he asked her quietly.

"Maybe."

"Are you still mad at me?"

"Definitely."

"Are you gonna let me make it up to you?" his voice was low and it was already doing things to Bonnies insides.

"Well, the least you do is try," her look told him to start groveling.

"How should I start?"

Bonnie pretended to think about it for a minute as she rubbed her cold feet up his pants leg.

"You should probably tell me how sorry you are," she suggested.

He tenderly kissed her forehead- "I am," he kissed her cheek- "so," he kissed her chin- "so," he kissed that spot below her ear- "so sorry for ruining the evening that you had planned."

He kissed her lips softly, "I'm so- so- so- sorry," he punctuated each 'so' with a kiss, "that I forgot to tell you how beautiful you look tonight."

"And I'm so, so, soooo," he spent the long 'o' sucking and moaning on her neck, "so sorry for upsetting you." He gently kissed the spot where he had left his mark on her.

"How am I doing?" He asked, looking into her face for confirmation his efforts were well received.

Bonnie was halfway drooling she was so turned on. She had kicked her right leg over Damon's and pulled his muscled thigh between hers.

"Don't stop, I'm still very mad," she said with a wicked grin.

Damon continued writing his apologies on her body with his mouth. He apologized to her shoulders as he worked the clasp behind her neck and pulled down the top of her halter. He apologized for being an idiot across her collarbones from one side to the next. He kissed his 'I'm sorries' down her arm to her fingertips, listing how badly he had screwed up.

With every apology Bonnie pulled her leg higher up his body until it was wrapped around his waist. She could feel his erection tapping at her doors, and she was ready for him.

"I didn't leave anything out did I?" Damon whispered against her fingers before sliding her digits into his mouth.

She gasped and her legs tightened.

"Did I?" he asked again.

Bonnie shook her head and grabbed his face and kissed him. Her lips tangled with his and his mouth was wet as it devoured hers. Her chest crushed against his as his hands dug into her waist and back holding her tight.

He shifted them so he was laying over her, her legs cradling him perfectly. "I don't know, I feel like I missed something…"

Damon was having way too much fun to stop now. Every moan, sigh, and gasp from Bonnie's mouth was like gold- no like air, and he needed more. He pulled her halter down further and finally revealed a pair of full round breasts. Her dark nipples were hard and Damon dropped his head, licked his tongue across one. He wrapped his tongue around it again and again, expecting the taste of chocolate, but what he got was even better. It was all Bonnie. It was cocoa butter and vanilla and he sucked on her tits until he had their flavor memorized.

Bonnie was writhing beneath him, she couldn't stay still. Her fingernails scratched his back as she dragged his shirt up and he lifted his head to help her tug it off.

Her hands traveled everywhere, covered his shoulders and pecs and down to his abs, around his back and then up again. His muscles bunched everytime she caressed him and she watched him move, watched him react to her touch.

He kissed her lips again, and then trailed down her body. His face pressed into the nylon fabric of her dress where it covered her stomach. His hands pushed her dress higher and higher and Bonnie lifted her butt up so her dress was now at her waist.

"You really did dress up for me," he cooed, admiring the lacy black thong she was currently soaking through.

"I wanted it to be special," she giggled breathlessly as he kissed every inch of the fabric. "I know black's your favorite color…"

"Babe," his heart squeezed. "You really thought of everything, huh?"

"Yeah, 'cause I'm good like that," she glared at him playfully. "Oh shit!" she gasped, his fingers had pushed aside her panties and were slowly rubbing up and down her slit. "What are you doin' to me?" she groaned.

"I told you," he watched her eyes widen, "I'm not done apologizing."

"Ah-Ah-I thought you h-had," Bonnie was panting now. She didn't know whether to squeeze her legs tighter or open them wider; she was doing the butterfly with Damon's face front and center.

"Oh no, I apologized to _you_ , but I haven't apologized to _her,_ " Damon slid his index finger into Bonnie's dripping pussy. She hissed and arched her back.

"Her?" she managed to say between clenched teeth.

"Oh yes. She is weeping, she's so upset with me."

"You're damn right she is."

Damon pushed her thighs wide and lifted Bonnie's ass onto a throw pillow. "You okay?" he asked as an after thought; there was only one lady he was focused on and Bonnie would have to wait.

Bonnie hummed her approval and practically demanded, " _Make it right, Damon_." That caught his attention. His head popped up and his dick jumped at the command in her voice and eyes.

He stared at her for a moment, at the vision she made lying there wide open for him, arms behind her head and gripping the arm of the couch. Then she had the audacity to wink at him and place her hand on his head and guide his face back to where she wanted it. It was the sexiest thing he'd ever witnessed.

Damon chuckled lowly, "Yes, ma'am." His tongue went to work expressing the anguish he felt at having misbehaved tonight. He told Bonnie's pussy how sorry he was for making her wait for him. He apologized for the way Bonnie had stopped him from doing this a week ago. Damon begged forgiveness from Bonnie's cunt like a man begging for his last meal and she fed him her tears and her cries and everything she had until Bonnie was shouting obscenities and gushing like a fountain.

Bonnie tried to tell him she accepted his apologies but it was all gibberish. She lay on that sofa, spent, trying to gather the pieces of her shattered body.

Damon climbed from between her legs and gazed at the effects of his handiwork. Her eyes were closed and she looked like she could fall asleep at any moment.

"Miss Bennett?"

"Uh-huh," she hummed.

"You still with me?" he asked. She could hear the grin on his face even if she could see it.

"Yeah, I ain't goin' anywhere," she smiled back.

 _(See I knew I was destined for_ _ **bigger**_

 _ **And better**_ _but never said a thing)_

….

 _I assumed there was only room for_

 _My dreams in my dreams so I'd sleep_

 _And repeat 'til the moon went home..._

Hours later the first hint of light began peeking through the curtains of Bonnie's bedroom. Damon lie there watching the curtains float in the breeze while he listened to Bonnie's slow even breathing.

He studied the walls of her room adorned with the trappings of her entire life so far. She had posters of musical artists and ballet dancers, shelves packed with books, dressers covered in cosmetics and hair product. Everything was neat and tidy and in its place.

Except where he entered the picture. His pants and shoes littered the floor, her dress was thrown in the direction of her hamper.

He brought his eyes back to the witch that was currently wrapped around him, a tangle of legs and sheets.

His Bonnie. She was perfect for him. It felt like she was made just for him. Just the way that he was in this moment of time, she was what he needed.

He had made it a point years ago to never apologize for his actions, because he lived his life unapologetically. But, if he had to beg forgiveness from Bonnie Bennett everyday of his life he'd never want for anything else.

 _And I didn't know where it'd take me_

 _But made me so crazy in love with it..._

Just thinking of the way he slid into her had him hard again. She was so tight, Damon was sure he wasn't going to make it all the way in before he busted a nut. She had tensed around him and squeezed her walls making it hard to continue, but he talked her down, saying anything to get her to relax just a little so he could inch his way further into her folds. Every part of her held onto him; her arms wrapped around his back, her thighs hugging his hips, and her feet crossed over his ass urging him on, deeper.

His spine should have snapped from how tight he was holding himself as he circled his hips and ground his way deeper till his balls touched her soaking wet opening. He had looked down at himself, buried to the hilt in her flesh and he was so fucking proud. She had taken every single inch of him, further proof she was made for him.

Sweat dripped down his forehead and she looked up him and wiped it away. His head rested a moment on her shoulder and she'd kissed him, licked up the side of his face, tasting the exertion her pussy was causing him. She wrapped her arms around his neck, held him flush against her as he circled his hips again.  
"Oh god," she'd whimpered. "Don't stop, Damon."

He shuddered when she'd said his name like that. He hadn't expected her to be vocal, telling him what she liked, what she wanted. He didn't know why it surprised him; she had no problem voicing her opinions at him any other time. But it made him even harder, hearing that encouragement.

He slid in and out of her, almost to the tip and then pushed himself back in, again and again. He would pull out halfway and go halfway back and then a little further at a time. But Bonnie kept telling him deeper, that she wanted all of him. He couldn't deny her.

Bonnie was meeting him thrust for thrust as he found his rhythm and began rocking into her faster. He braced his arm on the bed frame above her, and pumped into her until he felt that familiar tingle of heat in his balls. "Bonnie I'm bout to come," he warned her.

But she was beyond the English language at that point, she was all grunts and panting and screams, and each one made Damon push faster.

 _Then the universe aligned_

 _With what I had in mind..._

He chuckled as he remembered how his eyes blacked out for a moment and thinking 'Holy Shit, she just blinded me!'

Bonnie hummed from where she rested with her head on his chest. "Wha's funny?"

"Just remembering that time I hit it so good you popped every blood vessel in my eyes," he laughed again.

"That wasn't funny Damon," she pouted. "It scared the shit out of me." Now that she was awake she leaned up and kissed his eyelids again carefully.

"You're right, it wasn't funny then, but I don't know. I find it pretty hot that you literally blew my mind," he kissed her lips.

"Only you would find that hot," she wiggled from his arms and made to leave the bed, but Damon whined and pulled her back. "I am gonna pee on you, if you don't let me leave this bed," she promised and when his eyebrows quirked up, "and if you tell me you'd be into that R. Kelly shit, I swear to God, Damon!"

"Fine," he released her and she scurried away into the bathroom.

While she was in there, Bonnie checked herself in the mirror and was slightly mortified at what she saw there. Her hair was all over the place and what was left of her eye makeup from last night was smudged to high heaven. She saw a couple hickies in some interesting places, but it looked like Damon had been careful to put them where no one would see them. Bonnie wondered if he had actually thought that through at the time. She sighed and mumbled about him not having the decency to tell her she looked like a street rat.

She washed her face and then brushed her teeth, but she knew she wouldn't be able to do anything to manage her hair the way it was.

She turned the shower on and not two second later he was behind her when she turned back to her sink.

"What do you think you're doing?" he asked like he couldn't understand the concept of a shower.

"I'm taking a shower, geez, stop sneaking up on me," she stepped around him and looked around in her medicine cabinet for a new toothbrush.

"I can see you're taking a shower, I want to know why," he took the toothbrush she handed him and looked around for the toothpaste. She handed that to him too.

"Um, because my first class is in two hours and I can't leave here smelling like S-E-X," she stretched up on her toes and pecked him on the lips.

Bonnie got in the shower and proceeded with her morning ritual until Damon crowded in behind her.

"I'd like to introduce a new rule into our arrangement: No leaving the bed before the alarm goes off," Damon reached over her to grab a bar of soap and sniffed it. Flowers. Lilac, he noted.

"We didn't set an alarm," she said as she continued rubbing conditioner through her hair.

"Exactly!" he exclaimed. "We should get back in the bed and try again tomorrow." He kissed her soapy shoulder and pressed his erection into her back.

"You fiend. What am I gonna do with you?" She asked, as she turned around and lathered her shampoo into his hair.

"Any and everything, my dear."

 _Who knew there was a life_

 _Behind those four pink walls?_

…

 _Now I wake up to a different bedroom everyday_

 _Living up in the clouds thinking of how it all changed_

Bonnie was absolutely useless in class all day. She couldn't focus, she kept walking sideways into doors and dropping things. She should have just stayed home with Damon. She wished she had.

But one of them had to remember the guidelines they'd set- was it just two days ago? She shook her head thinking it felt like a lifetime already.

Bonnie's mind kept drifting to the events of last night- and again that morning in the shower. It was so much better than she had even expected. She was giddy and smiling, and she knew for a fact she was walking different. But it was more than that, she felt changed. Maybe it was the sex (it was probably the sex), but it could also be the fact she had someone and something to look forward to again. She had missed that.

Bonnie was busy thinking about how she had literally popped the vessels in Damon's eyes last night. She shouldn't feel good about that, but he seemed to find it amusing. It's not like he didn't heal pretty quickly. Still, it did put a damper on things for a little while. She would have to find another way to channel her magic when they were having Freaky Fun Time…

"Levitation?" Caroline's voice cut through her reverie.

"I'm sorry what?" she choked out.

"You said we should try levitation," said Elena. "Is that a spell in your grimoire that we can use against Klaus?"

Bonnie hadn't intended to suggest that out loud. That was an idea for a different occasion altogether.

They were standing in the school parking lot and Bonnie didn't even remember how she got there, her thoughts were a million miles away.

"Yes, that is something - um that I saw in my grimoire," Bonnie lied. "And right now I should go look into it some more, I'll see you guys later." She tried to make a clean getaway.

"Later?" Caroline was looking at Bonnie like she had lost her mind. "Bonnie, you just said you were coming to the Boarding House with us! To talk about Dr. Fell? What is going on with you, are you feeling okay?"

"I dunno maybe I'm coming down with a head thing. Don't worry about it, it's nothing," she played it cool. "So we're headed to the uh, Salvatores. That's cool."

Real cool.

When they got to the mansion Stefan led them in and they all filed into the living room, chatting. Well, Caroline and Elena were chatting but Bonnie was looking for-

"Hey, you're here!" Damon appeared at the top of the stairs with a wide grin on his face that faded slightly once he saw who Bonnie was with. "All of you are here. Did I know that all of you were coming here?"

"I-" Bonnie began but Elena jumped in.

"Stefan mentioned that you had some new theories about the killer," she looked up at him, her doe eyes shining. Bonnie pinched her lips together. "We figured you could fill us in. Something about Meredith Fell?"

Damon's eyes kept straying back to Bonnie as he relayed information and theories that they had already talked circles around.

He hadn't heard from her all day; they were doing the whole 'nothing clingy' policy so he just figured he'd see her when he saw her. That was all good in theory, but four or five hours into it Damon just wanted to check on her. Totally irrational, because he knew she was in class, but still.

And then she surprised him by arriving in his house unannounced as if he had summoned her from his thoughts. Unfortunately, her friends were with her and Bonnie was back to being aloof. She hadn't said a word to him since he walked in the room.

She stayed quiet, off to the side of the conversation discreetly levitating the items around her.

"And what do you think, Bonnie?" he asked her.

The chair she was in landed with a thud, and she looked surprised at being addressed. "Huh? Yes, I totally agree."

"With…?" He was putting her on the spot and she glared back at him.

"I agree that Meredith could definitely be a suspect and we should keep an eye on her. Look into her background and see if she has a record of any odd or violent behavior."

Damon looked impressed. He knew she wasn't paying a bit of attention to the conversation going on around her. She had summarized what they had talked about two nights ago.

"Sounds like a plan."

"Well, then great."

Stefan continued going through a list of other suspects to keep an eye on but Damon tuned him out.

Bonnie had very quietly gotten up and left the room.

"Be right back, my drinks missing a hint of O Neg," Damon excused himself and found Bonnie in the kitchen.

"Hey you," Damon greeted her, immediately pulling her into his arms.

"Hey, yourself," Bonnie replied. She leaned up on her toes to kiss him. "What are you smiling at?" she asked him.

"You. You look beautiful today," he told her. He enjoyed the way she blushed and smiled shyly. "Absolutely stunning."

"I look the exact same as when you last saw me this morning," she argued.

"So? You were beautiful then, too." Damon walked her backwards and lifted her to sit on the counter. "How was your day?" He asked, figuring that's what polite people did. He didn't really want her talking though.

"Hard," she answered. "Harder than I thought it would be."

Damon kissed away at her throat, "Why's that?"

"I was a bit distracted," she breathed. Bonnie trembled all over as his lips reacquainted themselves with her neck.

"Tell me about it, I started to call you like ten times today."

"Really? Why didn't you?" Bonnie's tongue found his earlobe and Damon's arms tightened around her.

"You were in class?"

"You could have texted me," she pouted.

Damon pulled his face out of her chest and set his hands on either side of her; he was suddenly finding it difficult to multitask. "Did you want me to?"

Bonnie looked into his clear blue eyes. She was struggling to stay on the same page as him. What if he wanted totally different things than she did? What if he wanted freedom and she wanted someone to rely on, to trust?

But looking into his eyes she didn't see a desire to run from her or push her away, she only saw a need for the truth, no games, no bullshit.

So she gave it to him. With her eyes focused on her lap, she answered simply, in a small voice, "Yes. I did."

Damon watched her struggle to answer such a simple question. He wondered why she clammed up all of a sudden, her heart racing more now than it was a minute ago when his tongue was in her mouth.

"Okay."

"Okay, what?" she asked.

"Okay, the next time I feel like texting you, I'll text you. Or call you. Or send up a Bat signal or something," he shrugged.

"Just like that?" Bonnie couldn't believe it. "I thought you said you hated those clingy couples?"

"Well, I've said a lot of stupid things," Damon kissed her cheek once more, before his ears perked up, alerting him to an imminent arrival. "Incoming!"

He zoomed around the kitchen. He stuffed an empty water glass in Bonnie's hands, pulled a bloodbag from the fridge, and was innocently leaning against the counter opposite from Bonnie when Elena pushed through the kitchen door.

"Hey, we're heading out now," Elena looked at Bonnie with concern in her eyes. "Are you sure you're feeling okay? Is your head bothering you again?"

Damon's eyes flashed over to Bonnie's face. But she shook her head slightly.

"I'm fine, I was feeling a little... dehydrated," she waved her prop glass. "All better, now. Thanks, Damon." She hopped down from the counter.

"Anytime, Witchy," his grin was overly salacious. "You just let me know when you're thirsty."

"Ugh, Damon grow up," Elena gagged.

"Yeah, Damon, gross," Bonnie added over her shoulder at him.

"Just being hospitable, ladies," Damon grinned.

…

 _All of the days that I wasted gazing outside the window_

 _Impatient frustrations let out into my pillow_

 _Lied awake at night while my head wandered_

 _And I wondered why_

 _Things weren't different.._

Together Damon and Bonnie carved a secret little bubble out of their friend group. They had codenames for things and secret meeting locations, but inevitably things always ended up back in Bonnie's bedroom.

By day, they fought and argued with each other and at night they made up. When they were together in public you would think they couldn't stand each other by the way they talked to each other, but behind closed (and spelled soundproof) doors they lived a whole other life.

Bonnie was amazed at the change in Damon's attitude. It was like getting to know a completely different person.

She found out that he was romantic when he planned their second date. He set up a candlelit picnic by the Falls and, in no uncertain terms, told her to wear something sexy because it was definitely a date.

Since they had lifted the ban on communications, Damon had found out why 'those people' talk to each other a hundred times a day- not because they have to, they want to.

Damon started out texting Bonnie about every little thing, just to be funny and maybe to get on her nerves, but then checking in became habit. And he realized he liked knowing what she was up to and who she was with. It made him feel closer to her when they couldn't be next to each other. They even found themselves texting each other when they were in the same room but weren't alone.

And Bonnie learned that she liked sexting. There was a thrill to sending illicit messages while looking her dad in the face or talking to Elena.

And the doors of Bonnies sex life had burst wide open.

Jeremy had been her first love and she had thought he was good. Passionate even.

But Damon showed her the true meaning of passion.

She wanted him all of the time. Damon teased her, "If I'd known you were such a freak I would've turned you out a long time ago."

Damon taught her things that should've made her blush, but she was game to try just about everything. She never thought she could be that comfortable with herself let alone another person, but Damon worshipped her body and told her every chance he got how beautiful she was; she trusted him completely.

Damon was slightly worried at first that he was pushing her too far into things she wasn't ready for. He didn't want her to feel like she had to keep up with him, but he needn't have worried. Bonnie could sleep for twenty minutes and be ready to go again. Night after night. And still get up for school the next morning. Often times it was Damon telling her they needed to rest.

Bonnie learned new ways to channel her magic during sex. Levitation was her favorite and after the second time she dropped them off the ceiling, she started to get the hang of it.

Damon threatened to install handlebars up there if she couldn't figure it out. He much preferred her to take it out on him, anyway. Told her he could take a little tough love. Though he was less enthusiastic when her idea of tough love heated through his sheets and nearly melted his skin off.

But at the end of the night it didn't matter, so long as Bonnie could fall asleep in his arms, and Damon could wake up in hers.

 _Everything shifted overnight_

 _Went from when boredom strikes to Ms. Star on the Rise_

 _It was all in an instant..._

Three weeks passed with them quietly falling for each other.

All of their preconceived notions about what they wanted from their arrangement had quickly went out the window.

Bonnie didn't want to believe it at first, but she thought it possible that she had gone and fallen in love with Damon Salvatore. The joy and excitement she felt whenever she was with him told her that their Freaky Friendship had morphed into something real right under her nose.

One night, they were all hanging out at the Grille playing pool- Damon and Stefan against Caroline and Elena, with Bonnie and Jeremy waiting to play the winners. Damon and Bonnie were doing their usual bickering routine and trading insults back and forth, when Elena fell into a tray of glasses and split her arm open. Her blood dripped down her wrist. Bonnie saw the veins tremble underneath Damon's eyes. She didn't even hesitate to grab his hand and pull him to the alley out back.

"I'm fine Bonnie," he told her, his face pinched like he was trying not inhale through his nose.

"You're not fine, you're thirsty. You haven't left my side for the last twenty-four hours, so I know you haven't been drinking regularly. Why didn't you say anything!"

"Because I'm fine, I can go a day or two without drinking blood," he rolled his eyes and paced away from her.

"Excuse me if I don't think it's fine that you almost vamped in public," Bonnie stepped into his space and his eyes glowed red again. "See."

"It's under control," he growled.

"Two days is too long to go without feeding," Bonnie took his arm again and pulled him into the shadows. "Drink from me."

Damon balked, "I am not drinking from you behind a dumpster, like some random snatch-and-grab, no." Bonnie didn't deserve that.

"I didn't ask you to drain me and leave me here, just drink from me, Damon," she swept her hair to one side and held her neck out to him.

Damon fought to remain lucid, but she was right, he was thirsty. He had dreamed of her saying this very thing one day, begging him to bite he dreaming now?

He gently laid a hand on her neck. "You're sure?" He was already planning just where to bite.

She shivered. "Damon. I trust you."

He pushed her back against the bricked side of the restaurant and bent his knees, wedging his left one between her thighs.

She held very still and tensed when he kissed her softly and traced his tongue over her jugular vein where her pulse was racing.

Damon could scent a faint trace of fear escaping her, but she hid it well, steeling herself for impact. He kissed and suckled her skin, slowly getting her to relax; he could feel her squirm under him.

Bonnie grinded into Damon. She had braced herself for incredible pain, not pleasure. "Shit,"she gasped.

Damon slipped a hand between them, beneath the asymmetrical hemline of her dress, into her underwear. Simultaneously, his fangs and his fingers sank into her, and she moaned at the intense mixture of pain and pleasure.

Her leg hitched higher around his and Damon quickly removed his fingers from her wet pussy and pulled her legs up around his waist. Bonnie's one track mind took over. Damon's lips never left her neck while Bonnie made swift work of the button and zipper of his jeans. In a move they had practiced and perfected, she pulled his engorged dick from his pants and placed the tip of him right at her soaking wet opening. Damon ripped her panties out of the way and he slid into her.

Her back arched off the wall. Bonnie couldn't remember how long they were out there or how long Damon fucked her and sucked from her. She only knew this was what she wanted. She wanted this man any and every way imaginable, even like this, with him tasting her blood and filling her with life at the same time.

They were so lost in each other that neither of them heard the alley door push open and a pair of heavy feet step out.

And neither one of them saw Jeremy until it was too late.

 _But those four pink walls, now I kinda miss them man_

… _.._

 **a/n: a lot happened in this chapter. fighting, makeup sex, the start of their "arrangement."**

 **I think that because they have both been burned by the faith that they put into their previous relationships, neither of them intended to open themselves up to being hurt again any time soon. So they are both reluctant to call this thing a relationship. Damon wants all the relationship things but doesn't want to call it what it is. And Bonnie sees how much she could already be falling for him, she just won't admit it first. Stubborn. But whatever they have, they like it so f**k It. I think it's also important to remember Bonnie may be mature as hell , but she's still seventeen. Still a teenager, still dealing with those insecurities, still very playful, and I like seeing her pull a younger, lighter side of Damon out.**

 **And they get caught by Jeremy. This boy has some good timing, right..**

 **-T**


	7. Track 6- Wild Things

**A/n: *** _ **(sings Chance)***_ **And we back and we back and we back…..**

Track #6- Wild Things

* * *

 _Find table spaces_

 _Say your social graces_

 _Bow your head, they're pious here_

 _But you and I, we're pioneers_

 _We make our own rules_

 _Our own room, no bias here_

 _Let 'em sell what they are sellin'_

 _There are no buyers here_

 _.._

Damon was snatched roughly back by his hair. (Later, when he had time to think, that's the detail he would blame, the hair pulling.)

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!"

He was shoved back in surprise, but when he caught on to who had interrupted him and Bonnie, he immediately knocked Jeremy to the ground. He was tempted to kick him while he was down there, but Bonnie's whimper of pain quickly drew him away.

When Jeremy yanked Damon out from under her, Bonnie had dropped to the ground on her ass. It felt like she had also landed on a wrist, not to mention smacking her head into the wall. "Fuck, Jeremy. What the hell are you doing out here?" she managed to grit out between clenched teeth while she clutched her wrist and tried to pull her dress down.

Damon was on her in an instant biting into his wrist and holding it out to her, but Jeremy was back up and in his face.

"Get the hell away from her, asshole!" he screamed, causing a scene and trying to tackle Damon away.

Damon growled, beyond angry at the fact that Bonnie was hurt further, because of this idiot man-child. Damon grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off his feet, fully prepared to snap his neck.

"Don't kill him, Damon," Bonnie sighed, reading his mind and intentions in his eyes.

"Why not?" he snarled.

"Cause I'm pretty sure I'm bleeding out over here," she chuckled weakly.

That snapped Damon out of his fury. He flung Jeremy halfway down the alley and vaguely heard him crash into a pile of trash. He sped back to Bonnie, biting into his wrist again, "Drink."

"Just get me outta here first," Bonnie's eyes were losing focus and Damon could see the wrist she was hugging to her chest was already swelling.

He carefully scooped his arms underneath her and easily lifted her, and in a blur they were gone from the ally.

Bonnie blinked and when she opened her eyes again she was in the passenger seat of Damon's car parked out front of the Grille. Damon was kneeling on the pavement in front of her and once again he bit into his wrist and held it out for her drink from.

Gladly this time, she accepted and spread her lips over his wrist and lapped her tongue over the wound he had created. The relief was almost instant as she felt the dizziness and nausea fade and her skin tickled as it wove back together.

Damon watched intently as the gaping wound on her neck healed. He focused on that instead of how good it felt to have her lips on him, sucking on him. He vividly recalled what else those lips wrapped around and his dick was responding, but he pushed the thought aside as quickly as it came to him. None of that mattered at the moment.

"How do you feel?" he asked when she pulled his wrist from her mouth. His eyes flew all over her, head to toe, checking to make sure every inch of her was perfect again.

"Good as new," she sighed and leaned out the car to peck him on the lips and rest her forehead on his. Damon rubbed her back.

"Good, because you're gonna wanna be conscious when your friends come running out of that building," Damon's enhanced hearing could make out Jeremy telling Elena and Stefan that Damon attacked him and took Bonnie.

"Oh, god," she pulled back to look at him. "I can't deal with them right now. Come on, let's go." She pulled her legs into the car and Damon closed her door before vamping to the driver's side.

He was backing out of the parking space when the front door of the restaurant burst open and the gang spilled out. He hit the gas, tires screeching and left them all standing there.

Damon looked over at Bonnie worried she was freaking out about everything that just occured. She had her face buried in her hands.

"Oh my god. Oh god," she groaned. "That is so not how I planned for them to find out about us!" she giggled.

"Wait, are you- are you laughing right now?" Damon glared at her, seriously wondering if she might be concussed.

Bonnie only laughed harder at the look on his face. "Jeremy just caught us- in an alley, going at it like animals- while you drank from me!" she dissolved into giggles. "Oh my god, he's probably so pissed right now."

"And how is that funny?"

Bonnie glanced over and finally noticed he wasn't sharing in the ridiculousness of the moment. "It just is… Come on, it's funny! What's wrong?"

Damon shook his head at her, "I just don't find it funny that you wound up with a head wound while having sex with me in an alley like some-" he stopped short.

"Like some- what, Damon?" Bonnie honestly didn't know where that was coming from. "What? Like a- a freak? A slut?" Bonnie watched his face in the dim light of the dashboard as he dismissed the names she guessed. "A whore?" That one. His face steeled at that one. "Like I'm some common whore? That what you were gonna call me?" She was shocked, but her anger was building by the second.

"No, I wasn't calling you a whore!" Damon said, sensing Bonnie's outrage brewing. "I'm just saying-"

"What, that I can be your freak in the sheets but not in the streets?"

"Look, you know I don't give a shit about having sex whenever and wherever-"

"But for me it makes me a _whore_?" Bonnie challenged.

"I am not calling you a whore, you said that!"

"Oh, now you're blaming me?! You were right there with me, so don't act like I fucked myself out there!"

Damon slammed on the brakes in his gravel driveway. "Stop putting words in my mouth and let me talk!"

Bonnie glared at him before launching out of the car and slamming the door behind her.

Damon caught up to her in the entryway, "Bonnie, I am not calling you a whore! Come on, why would I do that, I l-" once again he nearly bit his tongue off to stop himself from saying anything further.

"You what Damon?" Bonnie whipped around to look at him. Her chin was jut out and her nostrils were flaring, eyes flashing a dangerous shade of emerald.

Damon tried to back pedal and explain where he was coming from before she interrupted again, "I'm saying that is the furthest thing from what you mean to me!"

Bonnie narrowed her eyes at him and he took that as a sign to continue.

"I have spent a… vast amount of time in my life screwing women in alleys. Women that I couldn't describe or even name now. Women that I never even considered seeing again. But that has never once been the case with you. And doing with you what I've done with countless other faceless females… it just didn't feel right..." he finished lamely.

Bonnie's hard gaze on him felt like a lie detector test, like she was sniffing out bullshit and couldn't decide whether she smelled it or not.

So he continued, "I think drinking from you like that, for the first time, it just took me back to a different time and place. A different me. A me that I haven't been or thought about in a while. Ever since…" Damon took a chance and stalked closer to Bonnie, "Ever since you came into my life. I'm- I am different now; it feels like this was who I was supposed to be all along." He stood toe to toe with her now, staring down into her bright and wet green eyes. He lifted his hands to gently caress her face. "I don't ever want to be that...that monster with you."

Bonnie chewed on her lip and sniffed away her tears before they fell.

"So, what you're saying is… I'm not whore in this equation, you are?" the corner of her mouth pulled up in a grin.

Damon huffed out a laugh, "Yes, baby. I am the whore." He pulled her into his chest and wrapped his arms tightly around her. He felt fifty pounds lighter getting that off his chest.

"I'm the one that leaves her underwear in an alley behind a dumpster, but somehow you're the ho," Bonnie shook her head.

"Babe, I would never leave your panties behind," he pulled the torn fabric from his back pocket.

Bonnie gasped and snatched them from him, "Aww, I don't if that's kinky or thoughtful, but thanks!"

"Little of column A, little of column B," he replied with a smug smile.

She stood on her toes to wrap her arms around his neck and press her lips to his.

"For the record, Damon, you have never made me feel like something cheap or like you were using me. And I see the man you are now, even though I knew the man you used to be." Bonnie bit her lip. She was so close to using that L-word, but they weren't ready. It was way too soon for that.

Damon pressed his forehead to hers and listened to her steady heartbeat for a few moments before another sound caught his ears.

"Shit," he whispered.

"What's wrong?"

"The cavalry is approaching. I was really hoping we could just go upstairs and finish what you started."

"What I started? That was all your fault, not mine," she playfully shoved his chest and wiggled out of his grasp to head into the kitchen.

"You're the one who got all hot and bothered," he replied, right on her heels.

She grabbed a dish towel on the way to the fridge and Damon, seeing her intent scooped her up and set her on the counter and proceeded to make her an ice pack.

"Again, you're the one who started it. I only told you to bite me, remember?"

"Yeah, yeah. I can't help that you taste so damn good." He lifted his brows at her and she pointed at the back of her head. He carefully placed the bundle of ice on her tender skull. "Sorry about that by the way."

She shrugged, "It happens."

Before he could ask her how she was taking all this so well, the door to the kitchen banged open and Caroline blurred in with her fangs out, ready to tear Damon apart.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" she snarled and rushed at Damon. He was ready this time, though. He grabbed her the throat, picked her up, and slammed her back flat on the granite countertop of the kitchen island.

"Do not push me tonight, Blondie." Damon let her go. "It's not what it looks like."

"I know exactly what I saw!" Jeremy came barreling into the kitchen with a wooden stake in hand.

"Jeremy stop it!" Bonnie hopped down from the countertop.

"I'm going to kill him for what he did to you, Bonnie," Jeremy growled.

"Not if I kill him first," Caroline said as she flipped off the island. At that moment Elena and Stefan entered the room.

Bonnie jumped in front of Damon, "NOBODY'S KILLING ANYBODY!" Bonnie's magic pushed everyone back a good ten feet as she threw up a protective barrier around her and Damon.

"What the hell, Bonnie?" Her blast had nearly knocked Elena to the ground but Stefan caught her before she hit the floor.

"Jeremy told us what Damon did, why are you protecting him?" Stefan asked her. He looked ready to rip Damon apart as well.

"Because it's not what Jer-Bear thinks it is," Damon sneered.

"Damon didn't attack me," Bonnie added.

Elena wasn't buying it, "Bonnie you're covered in blood and Jeremy saw you two-"

"Yes, he bit me but he wasn't _attacking_ me, Elena," Bonnie tried to convey her meaning with her eyes. She needed for Elena to understand first. She was the only one Bonnie was really dreading 'coming out' to.

"Bonnie, I can smell him all over you," Caroline practically gagged. "I know what that asshole did to you." she charged at him and slammed into the invisible barrier.

"Jesus, Caroline! Calm down!" Bonnie shouted at her friend.

"Me? How can you stand there and protect your rapist?!" Caroline seethed.

"Whoa! No!" Bonnie and Damon both yelled.

"You think Damon _raped_ me?"

"You think I would _rape_ _her_? Or even could? She'd castrate me and make me eat my own nuts before I even blinked," Damon blurted out.

"What else would you call it, then!" Jeremy yelled at him.

"Okay, everybody stop!" Bonnie cried. "There has been a huge misunderstanding. Nobody was raped, nobody was attacked. Okay? Me and Damon were …" she searched for a politically correct phrase for it.

"Getting busy. Hooking up. Humping like bunnies," Damon supplied.

"Thank you, Damon, they get it," Bonnie smacked him in the stomach.

Everyone was silent for a moment.

"No. I'm not sure I do," Caroline was the first to speak. She shook her head, trying to piece together the new information. "You... and Damon?" She pointed between the pair of them.

"Yes."

"Are _sleeping together_?" she voice arced up at the end of the preposterous question.

"Every chance we get," Damon answered. Bonnie didn't bother admonishing him for that one; it was so true.

"No way," Jeremy said.

"Yes way," Damon replied with a satisfied grin at the look on Jeremy's face.

Caroline huffed out a disbelieving sigh. Her head was spinning as she tried to think how she could have missed that. "How long has this been going on?"

"Three weeks," Bonnie answered her friend. But she couldn't take her eyes off of Elena. Her friend was looking back and forth between Bonnie and Damon and down at where their hands had intertwined. Her mouth kept opening like she was going to say something, but she just silently gaped at them.

"You broke up with me to be with _him_?" Jeremy bit out between clenched teeth.

"You're kidding, right? What, did you forget that you cheated on her? With a ghost!" Damon started to step around Bonnie. He still owed the kid an ass kicking for that, but Bonnie stopped him.

"I wasn't talking to you!" Jeremy yelled. He took a breath and tried to calm himself. "This is a joke, right? You're not stupid enough to fall for Damon's act."

"Watch it, Gilbert." Damon warned.

"You are the last person that I have to explain anything to, Jeremy." Bonnie's voice was cold as ice.

"No. I don't believe that," he shook his head in denial. "Is he compelling you somehow?"

"Okay, you may be upset or disappointed or whatever, but you're not going to stand there and insult me. I make my own choices," she directed that last bit at Caroline, too. "And I chose to be with Damon."

Damon smiled with pride and rested his hand low on her hip.

Jeremy was still shaking his head as he backed away and stormed from the kitchen. Bonnie sighed. _One down._

"Three weeks?" Caroline asked. "You hid this- _how_ did you hide this for _three weeks_?"

"Magic, mostly?" Bonnie answered. "It wasn't easy keeping it from you, Care."

"Then why didn't you just tell me?" Caroline was hurt, Bonnie could see it.

"Because I know you don't like Damon. You've been very clear about that."

"And why would I? After all the shit he's pulled? The people he's killed! After the way he used me like some love sick puppet?" Caroline snorted with disgust. "You're goddamn right I don't like him." She stalked away.

"Care." Bonnie's voice broke at the look her friend had given her. She surged forward to follow after her.

"No," Elena stepped in her path. She looked at Bonnie like she had so much more to say. "I'll go." Her face was pinched into a bitter mask.

"Elena," Bonnie called out to her but she was already gone, chasing after Caroline.

Damon sucked his teeth. "That went well."

Stefan nodded. "So... Sorry I accused you of rape," he told Damon.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, by way," Damon said over his shoulder as he moved in front of Bonnie and pulled her into his arms. That was rough, even for him; he didn't know how she had managed it without breaking down.

She melted into his chest and clung to the back of his shirt. Bonnie felt like she had just gone ten rounds in the ring. But she made it out alive. Her friends seemed to hate her but she was relatively unscathed.

It wasn't the first time they'd fought, they would work through it.

"Well. Secret's out," she looked up into his eyes.

"Yeah, I'd say it is," Damon agreed.

"So what do we do now?" Bonnie asked.

"What do you want to do?"

"Could use a shower."

"That sounds like a good start."

"And then.. um," she sniffled. "I'm probably gonna want some ice cream." Her tears finally broke and streamed down her face.

"Oh, honey," he sighed, wrapping her in his arms again and murmuring all kinds of comforting platitudes. "I got you, I've got you."

 _So gather all the rebels now_

 _We'll rabble-rouse and sing aloud_

 _We don't care what they say, no way, no way_

 _And we will leave the empty_

 _Chairs to those who say we can't sit there_

 _We're fine all by ourselves.._

Damon drew a bubble bath and Bonnie lit every candle she could dig up. Damon took her hand and she lowered herself into the hot water, settling her back against his chest and resting her head next to his . He scooped water up her shoulders, down her arms and chest.

She hadn't said much since everybody left. Damon was trying to let her process in peace while still being there for her.

His mind kept echoing back to Caroline's reasons for hating him. All the shit he's done. All the people he had killed. How he treated her…

Damon knew she had every reason to hate him. He hadn't attempted to make amends for anything he'd done to her, save the few times he had assisted Stefan in saving her life. And even that had only been for Elena's benefit.

He wasn't a good person and it wasn't news to him. He just didn't like to think about it.

But he wondered if that's what Bonnie was thinking about now.

Was she thinking she had pushed her friends away for a serial killing vampire who not long ago used her best friend as a play thing to do his bidding?

Or was she thinking that just months ago he was actively trying to steal his brother's girlfriend, her other best friend?

Did she have regrets about being in this thing with him? Did she want out now that it wasn't a secret anymore?

He held onto that moment right before the shit hit the fan, when Bonnie told him she saw him for the man he was now and not the man he used to be. Could she truly see past all the things he had done and not hold it against him? How was that even possible?

Damon sighed and reached for the whiskey bottle he had on the floor next to the tub and put it to his lips for a drink.

"Can I ask you something?" the low rasp of his voice tickled her ear.

Bonnie hummed her assent and pulled the bottle from him and took a swig from it before passing it back.

"What are you thinking?"

"What am I thinking?" she repeated with a sigh. "I'm thinking… that our coming out party sucked."

"True. What else?"

"I'm thinking… we did a really good job at hiding our... Freaky Friendship. We surprised everybody." Bonnie traced her fingers over his pale kneecap where it jutted out of the water.

"That we did," he brushed his lips over her temple with a kiss. "What else? Really."

She sighed and took the bottle back, drinking from it swiftly before closing her eyes. "I'm trying to remember the last time that both of my best friends were mad at me. It almost never happens. We've been friends since kindergarten. And I can't think of a time when they were both angry with me at the same time. Like, me and Caroline would fall out and Elena would be mediator. Or Care and Elena would fall out and I'd be the go between. Or me and Elena. Until we patched things up. We always patch things up. I mean, we're girls. We've fought over boys before. That's what happens in small towns. If we didn't date our friends exes there would be nobody to date, you know. I ever tell you I went out with Matt once?

"You dated the quarterback?" Damon rolled his eyes.

"He wasn't the quarterback then. He was just the scrawny little boy that lived down the street from my Grams who tried to show me how to skateboard. We were thirteen. And we only went out for three days before Caroline told me how uncool he was and that he shouldn't be my boyfriend. And then low and behold three years later, he's starting on the varsity football team and hot enough for Elena to date and then Caroline after that."

Bonnie tipped the bottle to her lips again and took a pull and passed it back to Damon.

"So we've all been there. Dating exes isn't a big deal. It shouldn't be… But you're not even Elena's ex-boyfriend and she… ugh, with one look she made me feel like it was the biggest betrayal for me to be with you. And Caroline," Bonnie pressed her fingers into her eyes. "She's never…" she took a breath. "She was pissed. Like actual pissed."

"I'm sorry, babe." he murmured and wrapped an arm around her.

She shrugged. She was quiet for a few minutes and then wiggled loose of his arms so she could peer up at him. "Can I ask _you_ something?"

"Of course."

"What are you thinking?"

"How gorgeous you look in my bathtub," he replied immediately, making her grin shyly.

"What else?"

"How much I wanna kiss you right now."

She smiled and stretched her neck to press her lips to his. He licked her full bottom lip and pulled it between both of his before sweeping his tongue across hers. She giggled and pulled back.

"What else? Really."

Damon gazed into her searching green eyes and felt like he could tumble right into the depths of them. Right into her soul if he wasn't careful.

"I was thinking...that I only want to make you happy. I don't want it to be a burden to be with me. And that maybe I would ask you to be my girlfriend," his heart squeezed just saying that word, "You know- wear my pin, go steady. All that good stuff."

"Oh you want to date me now that the secrets out?"

"Eh, I figure what the hell? We've made it this far without killing each other, we might as well make it official."

"Might as well," Bonnie shrugged in blasé agreement. "If that's what you really want. But I don't want you to feel like you're trapped by what happened tonight, or like we _have to_ give it an official label just because people know about it now. We can just keep on-"

Damon covered her mouth with a sloppy kiss.

"I know we don't _have to_. But I want to be able to claim you as my girlfriend when I take you out."

"You want to take me out, too? Gee willikers, how'd I get to be so lucky?" she teased.

She turned in his arms and straddled his lap. "It's about time you made an honest woman out of me." Bonnie lazily wrapped her arms around his shoulders.

"Oh really?" he smiled, glad to lift her out of her somber mood.

"Yep. So…" she looked at him expectantly.

"So what?"

"You have to to actually ask me!" she exclaimed.

"Seriously?" Damon rolled his eyes and made a big deal of being inconvenienced about it. He set the whiskey bottle down on the floor and sat up straight. Bonnie tried to keep a straight face. "Bonnie Sheila Bennett. Will you do me the honor of being my girlfriend?"

Bonnie giggled, "Yes, Damon… Michael Salvatore, I will."

"That's still not it," he laughed at her guess.

"I'm gonna find out eventually. Ooh! Now I can ask Stefan!"

"Don't you dare, that's cheating."

"Fine." Bonnie scooped her hands in the water and pushed them through Damon's hair so she could play with it, making it stand straight up.

"We can do this, right? The real thing? A real _relationship_ ," she uttered the word that for the last three weeks they had tiptoed around like a landmine.

"It's been a while since I was in a real _relationship_. You may have to remind me how it goes."

"No rules this time. Can't we just… make it up as we go?"

"That's my girl, you already know that's what I do best."

Damon's hand slipped below the water and wrapped around his rising erection. He brushed the tip up and down Bonnies slit and watched her shimmy closer. She sat up on her knees and he lined up so she was taking just the head.

He kissed her again, teasing and light. "Thank you," he murmured against her lips.

"For what?" Bonnie gasped, working her hips back and forth, inching down on his dick.

"For staying when your friends left. For staying with me."

Bonnie took his face in her hands to look into his crystal blue eyes. "You are mine now. And I'm yours. And I'm not going anywhere." She sealed it with her tongue on his, just in case he didn't hear her the first time. Their tongues danced as Bonnie pumped her hips up and down his shaft.

"Hold on," Damon's arm tightened around her as he lifted them from the tub. Bonnies ankles crossed behind his back as she held on to his neck and he swung them into the glass shower.

The shower spray kicked on, dousing Bonnie and Damon as he held her against the tiled wall.

"Now where was I earlier before I was so rudely interrupted?"

"Right there, oh yeah. Hmm."

"You like it there?" Damon stroked her how he knew she liked and watched her face twist in pleasure.

"Yes, don't stop," Bonnie begged.

"Stop?"

"Don't stop Damon!"

"Say it again!"

"Oh god, Don't stop Damon."

Bonnie felt her orgasm within reach but something was missing. She couldn't figure it out until he licked her neck and his human teeth massaged her skin. "Yes! Baby bite me!"

Damon didn't let up, just kept sucking on her neck and pumping away at her tight pussy. But Bonnie wasn't having it. Her fingers wrenched him back by the hair to look at her, "I mean drink from me," she told him clearly.

"Bonnie.." he panted. She was tearing him apart; his human urges and his nature as a vampire were colliding and he struggled to keep himself human while his body was in control.

"Show me," she said, watching him nearly break himself trying to hide his vamp face from her. "Show me your face."

"Bon," he groaned. She couldn't be serious.

"Show me," she commanded and her magic reached out and enveloped him and wrapped around that part of him that he locked away from her and she brought it forth till his eyes glowed red and dark veins danced beneath them, his fangs dropped and he hissed at her.

He glared at her, but her wide eyes only traced over every inch of his face, committing it to memory before she pushed his face back to her neck, "Drink."

Damon was strong but his will was nothing against hers. He held her small body flush against him as he sank his fangs into her skin and her blood spilled into his mouth.

Bonnie ground her hips against him and Damon savored the taste of her essence, her life, her magic. It filled him and teased him, and drove him towards madness and when Bonnie screamed for him to fuck her harder he slammed into her relentlessly, he couldn't cage the animal she had loosed in him it fed on her completely and took everything she offered him of herself and gave it all back to her hers for the taking and Bonnie was convulsing around him and clenching her walls around his cock and as soon as he felt her milky cream hit his balls his body tightened and he pulled his fangs out of her for fear he'd bite her head clean off when he exploded inside her making her cum yet again. He turned their bodies so his back was against the wall and slid to the floor of the shower before his arms and legs gave out and he dropped her for the second time that night.

"Shit, Bonnie." He panted after he caught his breath.

"Mmhmm," her eyes blinked open. "Wow," she mumbled, resting her cheek on his chest.

She drew a small x right above his heart with her finger, "May I?"

"What?"

"Drink from you here?" she asked.

Damon looked around for something to stab himself with. Hell, he would rip his own heart out if she wanted it. She just grinned and traced that same cross over his heart and muttered " _secare_ " and he felt his skin slice open. She licked every drop of his blood before it could roll away and he watched the bite mark he had left on her fade away to nothing as her lips covered the mark she made on him. His dick stirred watching her and before he even healed they were going again.

 _So aye, we brought our drum and this is how we dance_

 _No mistakin', we make our breaks_

 _If you don't like our 808s_

 _Then leave us alone, 'cause we don't need your policies_

 _We have no apologies for being,_

 _Find me where the wild things are._

… _._

The following morning Damon made a huge breakfast of pancakes, eggs, bacon, fruit, juice, coffee - everything he could find he loaded on a platter and brought up to Bonnie, still asleep in his bed.

"You left," she grumbled when she heard him open and close the bedroom door.

"But I came back with this," he carefully set the heavy silver tray on his bed and pushed it to the center.

At the smell of bacon and coffee Bonnie's eyes popped open and her stomach rumbled.

"You cooked me a real-life breakfast in bed? Wow." She sat up and stretched and pulled the sheet up over her chest.

"I did, and it's not just cereal and a banana like usual," Damon tossed her a shirt and watched her pull it on before she dug into the food.

"Don't watch me."

"Can't help it, it's like watching the nature channel- I can't look away," he joked and she retaliated by showing him the food in her mouth. "Classy."

Damon fished a newspaper out from under the plate of pancakes and settled against the headboard.

"What are you doing?" she asked between bites.

"Neuroscience. What does it look like?" he shook the paper out and went back to reading.

"Since when do you read the paper?"

"I've always read the paper! I like to know what's happening locally, nationally."

"Aw, you're so cute right now," she giggled around the bacon in her mouth.

"What do you mean 'cute'? How is reading the paper 'cute'?" He glared over the top of it at her.

"I don't know, it just is. Please, continue reading, don't let me stop you." Bonnie went back to her meal and finished half of everything. She gathered the cup of coffee and went to settle in next to Damon and read over his shoulder.

"This is extremely domestic," she whispered loudly.

His lips twitched but he kept a straight face, "Is it?"

Bonnie rolled her eyes at him and let him live out his fantasy or whatever he was doing. She could admit it was nice, breakfast in bed and reading the paper together. Cute. He was going big for the relationship starter.

After getting bored with financial section, Bonnie went to shower and get dressed in a borrowed t-shirt and a pair of leggings she had left there.

Was it too soon to start leaving things at his place? When she slept over at Jeremy's she just borrowed something of Elena's-

The previous night came rushing back to her. Her and Damon had been so blissed out together she hadn't thought of it at all that morning. Had that been his real intentions, to distract her? It worked.

Damon was downstairs doing the breakfast dishes when Bonnie found him and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"Thanks again for breakfast, Sweetie," she said, trying out the endearment.

"You're welcome, My Darling," he replied, not skipping a beat. "I found your purse, Caroline or Elena must have brought it with them. Your phone rang a little while ago." He nodded his chin at the island.

"Oh," Bonnie went to check her phone and saw that Elena had called her and left a message.

"Elena called… She wants to talk to me," Bonnie said.

"That's good. It didn't take her long to come around."

"Yeah," Bonnie was hesitant though. That was very fast.

"She's gonna meet me at the house." She tucked her phone back in her bag, "I wonder if my _boyfriend_ would mind driving me home?"

"I like the way you say that," he pulled the stopper in the sink and turned, drying his hands on a dishtowel.

"Boyfriend? Or _driving me home_?" She said provocatively and backed up out of his reach as he stalked closer to her.

"Both, definitely both," he growled and chased a squealing Bonnie from the room.

….

 _I lose my balance on these eggshells_

 _You tell me to tread_

 _I'd rather be a wild one instead.._

Elena was sitting on Bonnie's front steps when Damon pulled up in front of the house.

Bonnie got out, said bye to Damon and that she'd call him later. Elena stood and waited for Bonnie to get to her before she spoke.

"I'm glad you came-" Both girls started.

Bonnie laughed it off and unlocked her door, "Come on in." She turned on lights and led the way to the kitchen, "You hungry, thirsty?"

"No, I'm good, thanks though," Elena answered quietly.

"Okay," Bonnie replied. She paused a moment to let Elena speak and when she didn't, Bonnie continued. "So... last night, huh."

"Yeah, that was kinda crazy."

"I know. That was not the way you guys were supposed to find out."

"How was I supposed to find out?"

That drew Bonnie up short. "I honestly don't know. But somehow, in my mind it didn't involve an angry mob," she said with a smile.

Elena just nodded.

"We were going to tell everybody," Bonnie started, but that was a lie. They hadn't ever really talked about telling anyone. "Okay, well. Not exactly. We figured it would eventually come out and we would deal with it, and so, here we are... dealing with it."

Elena still sat quiet.

"Okay, Elena just say it. Are you upset that I'm with Damon or that I didn't tell you about it?"

Elena's eyes flashed up. "Bonnie I'm not upset, I'm worried about you."

"You're _worried_ about me?" Bonnie repeated. "Why? I told you last night that what Jeremy thought he saw was a misunderstanding."

"So Damon didn't vamp out in the Grille and then feed off of you in the alley out back?"

"Well, I mean, yes, it happened, but it's not like how you're making it sound. I told him to drink from me, Elena, it's not like he forced me."

"Just like he didn't force you to have sex behind a dumpster?"

"Wow. Is that what's bothering you? Our sex life? Because that really isn't _any_ of your concern."

"It is my concern, I'm your best friend and you're hiding this huge part of your life from me!"

"I'm sorry, okay!" Bonnie exclaimed. "But at the time, it just seemed like it was best for everybody if we kept what was happening between us, just between us. I'd more or less just broken up with Jeremy and Caroline was finally talking to me again…"

"And you knew that if you told her you were seeing Damon, she'd flip out about it."

"Exactly."

"Well, doesn't that tell you something Bonnie? That maybe he isn't right for you?"

Bonnie eyes bugged and her mouth dropped. "Why are you here Elena?"

"I'm here because we care about you and-"

"Wait, _we_?" Bonnie asked.

"Jeremy's worried too, we all are."

"Oh my god! You discussed this with Jeremy? My vampire hating ex boyfriend, _that cheated on me_! Wow. That's great Elena. Of course he sent you over here." Bonnie couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"I came because I want to make sure you're safe," Elena said earnestly.

"And you think I'm not safe with Damon?"

"How well do you even know him, Bonnie?"

"How well did you know him when you made out with him in that hotel while you were with Stefan?" Bonnie wiped that earnest look right off her face. "Oh no, that's right, you'd broken up with Stefan because his humanity was off and he was running around like a psychopath biting peoples heads off! And how safe were you then?"

Bonnie waited for an answer and received none.

"But you think you're somehow more qualified than I, the Bennett witch that you come running to every single time you need a magical rescue, you're better suited to deal with a vampire boyfriend? Or is it just Damon?"

"It's not about me-"

"Cut the crap, Elena!"

"It's not!" she cried.

"Then why the hell weren't concerned for my safety when I nearly died trying to stop Klaus and save your life? Where's your concern been for the past three months while me and Damon have been tracking down lead after lead on how to get rid of the Original vampires that YOU drew to town?!"

"That is not fair, I didn't choose to be a doppelganger!"

"I know that! That's why I have been there for you every single step of the way! And now that I'm finally happy with someone you can't be happy for me for even a minute, you've got to come tearing it down."

"I am not trying to tear it down, I'm trying to get you to think about what you're getting involved in! Damon is dangerous, I know what he's like when he's-"

"When he is what? Obsessed? Infatuated? Delusional? Because that's not what me and him have."

"Then what do you have?"

"A relationship, for starters."

"This isn't a relationship, Bonnie! He is just using you to get to me!" Elena shouted. "And you can't see that because he's gotten in your mind, Bonnie. This isn't you and you know it."

Bonnie didn't know whether to laugh in her face or feel sorry that Elena actually believed she was right.

"You really think…" Bonnie started.

"That he's going to end up hurting you? Yes, I do."

"You know what- Fuck you, Elena. You need to go," Bonnie's throat was tight.

"Bonnie-"

"No. You've said enough."

"I just-"

"I said get out!" Bonnie was shaking from head to toe and soon all the glassware in the cabinets were rattling. Bonnie threw her hand out and the back door banged open, "Go!"

Elena looked frightened and appalled that Bonnie was close to hurting her. "Bonnie!"

Bonnie was beyond hearing her bullshit. She muttered a chant and held her palm outright and cast Elena out the house, the door slamming shut behind her.

Bonnie's anger and magic churned threatening to burn a hole in her stomach if she didn't release it somehow.

She dropped to her hands and knees and pushed her magic out from herself, letting it manifest in a ring of fire that surrounded her. The flames were tall, well above her head, and they danced as she let out her frustration and fury.

Elena had basically called her too stupid to know she was being used. She thought her weak and Bonnie hated appearing weak, because that wasn't who she was. She was always strong, for everybody. Always.

Elena accused her of not being herself, but Bonnie felt more herself with Damon than she ever had before. Damon wasn't the one trying to relegate her to the singular role of witch protector.

No, Damon wasn't the problem. And if Elena couldn't see that, then the problem was hers, not Bonnie's.

She took a deep breath and the flames died immediately. She had scorched her wood paneled floor and smoke blackened the ceiling, but all things considered she was lucky she hadn't burned her house down.

And Elena was lucky Bonnie had only kicked her out.

….

 _Don't wanna hang around the in crowd_

 _The cool kids aren't cool to me_

 _They're not cooler than we are_

An hour after he had left Bonnie at her house with Elena, Damon was cleaning his room, changing his sheets, scrubbing the bathroom. Anything to keep his mind off his girlfriend.

He had seen Elena's face before he left and she didn't appear to be happy for either of them.

But Bonnie had insisted they could work things out, she just had to explain some things and they would be good. So, he'd left.

But he had a bad feeling.

He was waiting for Bonnie to give him the all clear so he could return to her, but instead Elena came bursting into his house, screaming his name.

Damon blurred from his room and was in front of her in a second.

"What happened?" he grabbed her shoulders but she knocked his hands off of her.

"What did you do to Bonnie!" she screamed.

"What are you talking about? Is she okay?" Damon's voice inched up an octave.

"No! She's out of her mind! She just threw me out of her house!"

"What happened, Elena?" Damon looked her over and she didn't appear harmed at all, he smelled no blood on her, hers or Bonnie's.

"That's what I want to know! What did you do to her? Bonnie would never hurt me like she did if you weren't influencing her somehow!"

"Elena, what are you talking about?! Where is Bonnie?"

"I don't know, I told you- she threw me out of her house. Physically, kicked me out. On my ass."

"What? Why would she do that?"

"Because you've turned her against her friends!"

Damon pinched the bridge of his nose, "Okay."

Now that Damon could guess that both Elena and Bonnie were more or less physically fine, he could breathe better and try to put what Elena was saying into context.

"Let me guess, you think I'm somehow compelling Bonnie and using her?"

"Obviously," Elena hissed.

"And you think I'm using her for what? For her powers? For sex?"

"Pfft," Elena rolled her eyes at him.

"No," Damon studied her for a moment before it dawned on him. "You think I'm using her to hurt you?"

"Aren't you!"

Damon blinked at her, "Why would I do that?"

"Because! Because you want to be with me, but I'm with Stefan. I love Stefan."

"I know that, Elena. That's why I moved on."

"Oh, and you just happened to move on with my best friend? How could you do that to me, Damon?"

"Do that _to you_? Have you lost your mind?" Damon crowded over her now. "You're the one that strung me along for a year and a half while you dithered back and forth between whether or not to act on feelings for me. And then you took my brother back after everything. And I stepped out of the way. What did you think was happening? That I was still waiting for you to make up your mind? I did that! And so did you."

"Then why didn't you tell me about you two? Why keep it a secret from me?"

"Because I don't need your permission, Elena. Or your approval or validation or whatever. What I'm doing with Bonnie is between me and Bonnie. You can get on board or get the fuck outta the way!"

Damon left her standing there and slammed the door on his way out of the house.

He gunned his Camaro to Bonnie's house and hit the pavement running in search of her.

"Bonnie!" he let himself in and paused when he couldn't hear her anywhere. "Bon?"

"I'm out here!" her voice called from out back.

Damon sighed. He headed through the kitchen and stopped immediately to stare at the scorched ring in the floor. He ran outside to find some answers and instead found Bonnie swinging an ax over her head. The ax landed in a tree stump and Bonnie huffed and grunted as she pulled it out again.

"What the hell is going on?" Damon was more confused than ever.

"I am- chopping wood," she panted and swung the ax into the side of the stump this time.

"Are you sure?" Damon mumbled under his breath. Out loud he asked, "Why are you chopping wood?"

"Because I nearly set my kitchen on fire and this was the sharpest thing I could find in the shed." She swung the ax again. She hadn't hit the same mark twice yet, hack marks covered the stump on all sides.

"Can you put the ax down?"

"No, Damon. If I stop, I will set something else on fire. So, no," she swung again.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked.

Bonnie looked at him a moment before yanking the ax out of the wood. "No."

"Can I talk about it?" she didn't stop him, so he continued. "Elena came to see me."

"Rrrrgh," Bonnie growled and swung the ax down into the stump. "And?"

"And she told me she thinks I'm screwing you to get back at her."

"And?" she gritted out.

"And I told her she was nuts."

"What else?"

"I told her to get on board with me and you or get outta the way."

"You said that?"

"I think I said 'or get the fuck outta the way,'" he corrected himself.

"Good," she stopped her manic chopping and dropped the ax to the ground and rest her hands on her hips.

Damon could finally get close to her without fear of losing a limb. She was still wearing his black v-neck shirt, but had rolled the sleeves up to her shoulders and cinched the front of it into a tight knot over her stomach. Her hair was falling out of the messy bun she'd pulled it into.

"Care to tell me why you're going all Lumber Jill this poor stump?"

"I just felt like hitting something," Bonnie opened and closed her hands. They were raw from how tight she'd been gripping the ax handle.

"What happened?"

Bonnie plopped down in the grass a little ways from the wood chips she had created and Damon followed suit. She filled him in on what Elena had said.

"And then I was so mad, I was seeing stars. And she was still talking! So I cast her ass out the back door. And nearly burned up my kitchen before looking for a better outlet for my anger. Preferably outdoors and physical. Hence the ax," she concluded.

"And you're angry because?" he asked quietly.

"Why wouldn't I be angry? She came into my house and insulted me. And you. Like I'm not good enough for you. Like she's better than me or some shit!" Bonnie was on her feet again and picking up her ax. "Like she's the only one who is allowed to fall in love with you." She hacked away at the stump and yanked it out. "Like you're still in love with her," hack. "Like it's so preposterous-" yank. "For you to really want me," hack.

"But you know she's wrong?" Damon stopped her before she could yank the ax from the stump again. "You know none of that's true, right? You know that's not why I'm with you."

Bonnie blinked up at him. "What? Of course. Why- why would you think I thought that?"

"It has never once crossed my mind to try to use you to make her jealous. You know that. Right?"

"Yes, Damon, I know that. Geez! Do I have 'gullible' written across my forehead or something? 'Cause apparently nobody believes I can make up my own mind without somebody doing it for me!"

"I know you can make up your own mind, I just didn't want Elena's _crazy_ to rub off on you." He waved a hand at her, "So glad it hasn't!"

Bonnie paused and took stock of herself for a moment. She had to laugh at that. He was right. Elena's crazy had infected her. She was hacking away at a tree stump in the middle of her backyard and yelling at her boyfriend for no reason.

She sighed, closed her eyes and stumbled forward into his arms. Damon caught her and held her for a minute. "Sorry I took it out on you. You're not the one I'm mad at."

He brushed the damp strands of hair back from her face."It's okay. Unlike that poor tree stump I can take it."

He led her back inside the house, commenting on how he was buying her a book on gardening because even he knew she was doing it wrong.

She went upstairs to shower and change while Damon called his brother.

"Stefan-"

" _What the hell, Damon? What did you say to Elena? She's over here crying, I can barely get a word out of her."_

"Okay, well she started it." He opened the cabinet under the sink where Bonnie hid his bourbon.

" _That's not helpful."_

"What do you want me to say? I need to talk to you. In person. Come to Bonnie's."

" _I'm busy."_

"I'll be here." He disconnected the call and poured a drink.

Two hours ago had been just about as happy as he got and now it was crumbling around him.

Both of Bonnie's best friends disapproved of this relationship, hadn't even bothered to give it a chance. They already had their minds made up about him. And Damon didn't give a shit about what people thought of him, but where Bonnie was concerned? She didn't deserve the blow back from his past mistakes.

He would make it right. He had to.

 _We will carve our place into time and space_

 _We will find our way, or we'll make a way_

 _..._

* * *

 **A/N: Well well. Thoughts?**

 **Yes, yet another Bamon fight there at the beginning, are you sick of them fighting? I can't help it, it's what they do. Jeremy's somewhere raging. Elena assumes its all about her. Meanwhile Bamon are finally an official item, using big bold words like relationship and dating. Even if they still won't use the biggest boldest L-word yet. But still, its progress. Any guess on how Damon plans to make it right?**

 **Leave a review!**

 _(secare-Latin for cut)_


	8. Track 7- Stone

Track #7 - Stone

 _So much on my mind, I think I think too much_

 _Read between these lines, unspoken weight of words_

Stefan finally showed up at Bonnie's several hours later while she and Damon were making tacos.

Bonnie ran to the door while Damon was browning the meat.

She surprised Stefan when she threw open the door, yelling "This is a judgement free house, Salvatore! It's my safe space and if you can't get with that then you are not welcome. Understood?"

"Don't listen to her, Stef!" Damon hollered out from the kitchen. "She's just mad she's got the palate of a ten year old!"

"NO judging! Not my crap taste in food or men," she pointed a stern finger right in Stefan's face. Stefan figured there was a fifty-fifty chance she was being serious.

"Hey, I heard that! Rude," Damon appeared right behind her. He popped a kiss on her neck and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "You're supposed to be nice to me now," he fake whispered in her ear.

Bonnie rolled her eyes, smiling sweetly, and said to Stefan, "Dammit, I keep forgetting that part. Come on in, Stefan."

Stefan's eyebrows looked like they may have have taken up permanent residence in his hairline, but he entered the house with an amused grin on his face.

"No judging from me. I promise," Stefan agreed.

Damon passed the spatula off to Bonnie and she returned to the kitchen where she cranked her music up, trying to give the guys a little privacy.

Damon led his younger brother into the living room.

"So," he said, turning to face Stefan. "Give it to me straight, what's the damage?"

"The damage?"

"Yes, Stefan, the damage. How badly have I ruined a ten year friendship?"

"Why are you asking me and not Bonnie?"

"Because, Bonnie's in a weird place right now where she's happy to avoid thinking about how much friends are mad at her, and I've been keeping her distracted with sex and food. Your turn."

"Okay, thanks for that tidbit that I didn't need to know," Stefan rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger trying to dislodge the mental image of his brother and Bonnie.

"I mean, it's great sex," Damon added with a self satisfied smirk. "Terrible food though, she actually makes tacos with those shells from a box. Ugh." He shuddered.

"What am I doing here? You couldn't give me TMI over the phone?"

"No, I couldn't. Because I need at least one person to understand that this isn't me using Bonnie for sex or compelling her. Or trying to piss off Elena," Damon's eyes were pleading with Stefan. "I need you to believe that this is real and that it's not the end of the world for Bonnie Bennett to be dating me."

Stefan took a moment before he spoke. He thought of all the times he had seen Bonnie and Damon together over the last few months. He had to admit that they seemed closer, they were certainly working together more and even hanging out. Damon had blown him off a couple times to meet up with Bonnie, claiming he was helping the witch with a project. Stefan hadn't realized their relationship had grown past friendship, though he had suspected that his brother was involved with someone new. He just didn't figure it would be Bonnie.

"I thought Bonnie hated you," Stefan remarked aloud.

"She never _hated_ me…" Damon scoffed but even he couldn't pull off that one. "Okay, well she hasn't hated me for a while now."

"Oh, yeah? And how did you manage that?"

Damon fed him his devilish smile, "Come now, brother. You know as well I do that the Salvatore charm can be devastating." But Stefan wasn't buying it. "Honestly, I don't really know how it happened. One day we were mortal enemies and the next frenemies, and then we were just cool and then it was hot and now it's real. And I _like_ her Stefan." Damon shrugged like he didn't know what to do about any of it.

Stefan hadn't seen his brother look this...unguarded in almost and a century and a half. He was obviously concerned about Bonnie but he still had this air about him that wasn't what Stefan was used to seeing: selfish, smug, diabolical, homicidal…

Stefan could see it in his face that he genuinely cared for Bonnie.

"Okay, I believe that you aren't trying to hurt Bonnie."

"Yes!" Damon gave a small fist pump of victory.

"But what does any of this have to do with me?" Stefan asked.

"Well, now you have to help me convince your girlfriend and Blondie Bear to believe me, too."

"Oh, no. No way. I don't want to be in the middle of this."

"No fair, you're supposed to take my side, you're my brother!"

"You yelled at Elena."

Damon sighed, "She need to be yelled at, she was talking crazy."

"Why don't you try talking to her again, without calling her crazy this time, maybe."

"They aren't going to listen to me, yesterday they wanted to kill me!"

"Most days I want to kill you, too," Stefan pointed out.

"That's just it, this isn't about me! It's about the woman that I -" Damon faltered, "the woman that I am starting a relationship with, fighting with both of her best friends. Now, tell me, is that what Bonnie deserves after all she's done to help us? Hmm?"

Stefan hated that Damon was laying on the guilt so thick, but he did have a point. If it was within his power to help Bonnie out, he did owe it to her to do so.

"What do you want me to do?"

"I just need you to talk to them and tell them about this," Damon gestured toward the kitchen. "About how you believe us and respect it. They trust you, they'll listen."

"Fine. I'll see what I can do. But I can tell you now, Caroline doesn't want to hear it. And Elena is convinced that Bonnie needs an exorcism."

"An exor-? Look, Bonnie is fine, more than fine, she is happy with me. And they would see that if they cared to look. Can you just make a case for me? I need to you you have my back here," Damon felt like he was begging and he didn't do begging very well. Stefan grabbed Damon's wrists and twisted, breaking his sudden hold on Stefan's shirt.

"I already said I would do it."

Damon inhaled and breathed out a sigh of relief. "Well, okay then. Good."

"Great," Stefan griped. He wasn't much in the mood to tell Elena she was wrong.

"Now that's settled, you're staying for dinner."

"That's really not necessary."

"Oh, but it is. If I have to eat her food, then so do you." Damon's grin turned devious.

"This is the thanks I get for helping you?" He was amused to see this side of his older brother.

"Don't worry, the food sucks but the company is fantastic."

..

Stefan spent the rest of the evening observing the way Bonnie and Damon behaved together. He noticed the way Bonnie smiled everytime Damon touched her and that Damon touched her whenever he could. He wasn't even being obvious about it, in fact he seemed to be restraining himself, but his hands still found a way to caress her shoulder, knee, arm, literally anything that was in his reach.

And Bonnie was no better. She went out of her way to lean into his space, not to crowd him, just enough to tease him before she leaned away again.

And the way they laughed together even while poking fun at each other. That part he was familiar with, but he kept thinking back to last night and how they each jumped to defend the other.

By the time Stefan left the house, he had not a single doubt that Damon was as smitten as a schoolboy and Bonnie was right there with him.

Now he just had to explain that to Elena and Caroline.

…

"Hey… Are you awake?"

…."No."

"Guess what?"

….. "What?"

"I want to take you out on a date."

"M'kay, now go to sleep."

"That's it, that's all the excitement I get?"

"It's...," Bonnie peeked at her alarm clock, "3 AM. That's all the excitement I got."

"Ha, bet I can get you excited."

That woke her up. "Why are you taking me on a date?" She finally rolled over to her back and Damon slipped between her legs.

"That's what dating people do, they date. Each other."

Bonnie squirmed as Damon kissed a trail down her chest and stomach to her thighs.

"I know that, but why are _you_ doing it?"

Damon's head popped back above the covers. "I'm sorry, did you want someone else to ask you out?"

"No, I just mean, you don't have to keep doing that."

"Doing what?"

"Distracting me with sex and relationship milestones," she laughed. "Like, I'm just curious, is there some kind of checklist that you're working through or what?"

"Hey! I'm not trying to distract you!" He exclaimed, boldy lying through his teeth as he sat back on his knees.

"Babe, you totally are. And don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely enjoying it, I am!" Bonnie pushed up on her elbows and rested on her left hand. "I think it's adorable what you're doing for me, and I am grateful for the distraction. But I'm not some little girl that's gonna breakdown just because my friends are being bitchy. I can handle it."

"You shouldn't have to handle anything."

"But I can."

"No, I'm saying, if they had found out that you were secretly dating anybody else, say the quarterback or the student council President, or even some mysterious college guy, there wouldn't be a problem. You guys would be gushing over how cute and smart and funny or tall he is and not be pitted against each other."

Bonnie smiled slightly, "Considering Caroline is SGA president I think we'd be having a whole other kind of argument."

"You know what I mean."

"Yes, I do. And it is not your fault," Bonnie sat up and cupped his face between her palms. "Nor is it your responsibility to fix it. Either we will figure it out or… we won't," she shrugged sadly. "I'm just saying this isn't on you."

"It feels like it is," Damon admitted.

Bonnie gasped, "Babe, that's because you feel guilty," she flung her arms out and addressed an imaginary crowd, "Ladies and gentlemen, it is a miracle! Damon Salvatore _feels_!"

"Would you hush! I've got a reputation to uphold!"

"Mm-hmm, yeah right. This is all I need, right here. You and me."

Damon pulled her up closer to straddle his lap.

"And what if it gives me great pleasure to ply you with sex and relationship milestones? What if that makes me the happiest I've been in I don't know how long?"

Bonnie caught a shiver when his voice dipped low and sexy like that. "Well, I guess that's just something I'll learn to live with," she grinned into his lips, kissing him softly into the night.

 _But time comes to rest when you are by my side, it blurs.._

…

Later that evening, after an extremely well planned and executed date, Damon drove them back to his house.

They'd had dinner at the Grille, followed by a movie at the cineplex and then ice cream cones and a walk around the town square.

They were still sitting and making out in the front of his car when Bonnie chuckled out, "That was a lovely date, Damon. Thank you for the ice cream."

"Okay, why do you keep laughing like that?" Damon demanded.

"I'm not laughing, I swear!" Bonnie giggled again.

"Just spit it out, you hated the date, didn't you?" Damon couldn't blame her. It wasn't exactly his best work, but it was short notice and it wasn't like the town had that much to offer.

"No! It was the best date I have ever been on, Damon."

"Then what aren't you saying?" Damon insisted, watching her avoid his eyes.

"It's nothing… I had fun, I promise!" Bonnie vowed.

"But?"

"You're not gonna let this go?"

"Not now."

"You really want to know?"

"I asked, didn't I?"

"Okay, fine," she sighed. "It was a very lovely date and I did have fun...but that wasn't the first time I've been on that exact same date…"

Damon paused a moment to process that. " _That exact same date?_ "

"It's kinda like the standard Mystic Falls first date," she shrugged.

"And how many times have you been on that date?"

"Really?"

"Yes, really."

Bonnie rolled her eyes and thought back on all the guys she had been out with in the last couple years. As she counted back in her head, Damon sat in disbelief of how the night had turned out.

"Like, maybe seven or eight times," She squinted trying to think if she had missed one.

" _Seven or eight times_!" He exclaimed. "Why didn't you say something?!"

"I was having fun… and I don't know. I guess I was waiting for the good part," Bonnie winced at how that sounded.

" _The good part_?" Damon huffed a sardonic laughed. "Wow," he climbed from the car. "I can't believe I got scooped by _seven or eight_ other guys."

Bonnie scrambled out after him, "No! At least two of them do-over dates with the same guy!"

"That doesn't help, Bonnie!"

"I'm sorry, but you asked!"

"I shouldn't have asked."

"No, I shouldn't have said anything."

He opened his front door for her, saying, "No, I'm glad you did. It's good to know that I've got to bring my A game from now on. No shortcuts."

"Hey, you are already better than every other guy I've ever been out with, do you hear me? You're the only one that has ever finished that date with me in his house and ready to do whatever it takes to thank him for taking me out," Bonnie popped the button on his jeans and pushed her hand down his pants.

"That may be the case but-"

"But nothing," Bonnie silenced him with her lips over his and her hand wrapped around his dick.

Damon moved them out of the entryway and to the next room, before Bonnie dropped to her knees.

"You can't thank me for a date you've been on before," Damon gasped as Bonnie's tongue circled him.

"I can do what I want," Bonnie stood to her feet and pushed him back to the couch, "remember?"

"I am vividly aware of that fact," he grunted as he plopped down.

"Then shut up and let me do it."

"Yes ma'am."

Bonnie had him in her mouth for all of thirty seconds when the front door burst open, and Caroline stormed in with Elena close behind her.

"No!" Damon groaned out loud. "Get ouuut!"

"Oh my god!" Elena covered her eyes.

"Ew, I can't unsee that," Caroline clenched her eyes closed. "Bonnie, we need to talk."

Bonnie tried to fix Damon's pants but he smacked her hands away before she accidently caught him in the zipper, "What are you guys doing here?"

"Elena told me you used your magic on her. Bonnie you're not in your right mind, Damon is doing something you, and you can't trust him!"

"Caroline's right, Bonnie. You can't trust him."

"I thought Stefan was going to talk to you, explain things," Damon stood up.

"Oh, you mean make a case for his brothers defense. We've heard it all before, Damon!" Caroline stopped him. "You've changed? You're not a bad guy? You only want what's best for her? Bullshit! Because if you wanted what was best for her you'd know it wasn't you."

"How the hell do you know what's best for me?" Bonnie demanded.

"We're your best friends Bonnie, we are trying to help you," Elena said, trying to play peacekeeper.

"She doesn't need your help," said Damon. He was done with the theatrics and drama and explaining himself. "She's got me. And if you two wanna stand there all holier than thou and judge her for who she wants to be with then screw you. That's on you, it's not our problem."

Bonnie looked up at Damon and at that moment she knew it. She knew she loved him then. He took the words right out of her mouth.

"We're done answering to you, and I'm done with you coming to me with this shit," she looked them both in the eye and her voice dropped dangerously low as she stepped right up to Caroline and then Elena. "It's not a phase or some rebellious streak or Damon compelling me. _This is me_. And when you finally pull your heads out of each other's ass and decide to be happy for me, then you know where to find me."

Bonnie pushed her way between them both and stalked out of the house.

Damon gave Elena a cold smile, "Or don't. Trust, we're fine either way. And I'll be taking good care of _all_ of Bonnie's needs."

He followed her from the house and slammed the door behind him.

 _And I will follow where this takes me_

 _And my tomorrows long to be unknown_

 _In a world uncertain, say you'll be my stone..._

 _..._

After that night it was just him and Bonnie for a while.

She went to school like always, but she came home to Damon now instead of an empty house.

And like he had told Elena and Caroline he was taking good care of her.

Damon took her grocery shopping and made her get more than frozen dinners and cereal. He stopped letting her cook by herself and started showing her recipes he had picked up or they learned new ones together.

He helped her with her magic, letting her try out spells on him, helping her research and translate things.

She helped him hunt, picking out people in bars to snatch, eat, and erase. She made up the cover stories that Damon compelled them to believe. They worked well together.

They weren't hiding anything anymore. Bonnie was very open about her relationship with everyone left in her life; Stefan, Alaric, Matt. Though Matt was a bit skeptical at first, all it took was seeing Bonnie smile when Damon kissed her and he was sold. He, of course, threatened to stake Damon if he hurt her in anyway, but he knew Bonnie could take care of herself, she always had.

Somehow, even Esther Mikaelson weighed in on the matter, telling Bonnie he was an abomination. That conversation didn't last long.

They fought each other daily, but it never lasted and by night they were making up again.

And some things they didn't have to fight about.

Like the day Damon told Bonnie he bought tickets to a ballet in DC and she said she couldn't go because she didn't have anything that nice to wear. For that one he showed up at her door and demanded to take her shopping immediately.

He pulled his wallet out and told her, "Here, you can take the Black one, the Gold one, hell take the Blue one too." He shoved his credit cards into her hand. "Because if you ever tell me again that you don't have something, we're gonna have a problem."

Bonnie was shocked to find him so serious about it, his stony face held not even a hint of humor or sarcasm.

"You are knowingly and willfully handing over multiple credit cards to me? And taking me to the mall? With the intent to let me get whatever I want?" She needed to clarify before she actually went through with it.

Damon sighed. "What, are you going to tell me how much of caveman I'm being for wanting to buy you nice things? I like nice things, I like seeing you in nice things. Things you wear specifically with me in mind. I am a hundred and seventy years old and I have money to spend and I want to spend it on my girlfriend. Is that alright with you?"

Bonnie took a moment to gather her thoughts before she took a deep breath and said, "Can we… Can we pretend that I argued with you for like half an hour about how inappropriate it is for you to want to dress me like a doll?" Bonnie launched herself up into his arms, catching him off guard. "Cause I swear to god, I am a feminist, but that was sexy as hell."

Damon smiled, relieved that she wasn't going to fight him on this. "I won't tell a soul how quickly you caved to your Pretty Woman fantasies."

She didn't let them leave for another two hours.

 _Change in every wind_

 _The sands of time don't know our name_

 _Oh nothing's sure, but surely as we stand_

 _I promise I will stay the same..._

Damon knew he was in love after he spent six hours with her in a shopping mall. He didn't care at all, just kept watching the smile on her face as he agreed to get her anything she liked.

He slipped away to buy her something special at the jewelry store. He was really going all out, playing up the Richard Gere role to her Julia Roberts.

Two days later he drove her DC for the show and presented her with a ruby choker dripping in diamonds. She could hardly take her eyes off of it long enough to let him put it on her.

"Damon, this is way too much," she tried to argue.

"No, it's not. It's beautiful, you're beautiful," he claimed quite simply.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome," he grinned and swiped a stray tear from her cheek. "Now, let's go watch some dancing."

"Do you even like ballet?" she asked as he opened the car door for her.

"I can appreciate the art form," he rolled his eyes.

Bonnie laughed, "So, that's a 'no' then."

"Look, I'm willing to keep an open mind. I know you like ballet, so that's all that matters," he said casually.

Bonnie hid a smile. It still surprised her when he did that; when he noticed the small things that she didn't have to tell him or he remembered something she mentioned ages ago. He may not think it was a big deal for him to sit and watch a three-hour ballet just because she liked it, but it was a big deal to her. Everything he did was a big deal to her. It was the first time anyone did anything with her being the sole benefactor and it was a rush for her.

The rush for Damon was watching that smile she tried to hide. That smile that said he had scored major points and she was happy but didn't want to hear him brag about it. It never worked, he always rubbed it in later just how awesome a boyfriend he made.

It surprised him just how easy it was to earn that smile. Some nights he had to work for it, but more often than not he'd look up and she'd be beaming at him for just telling her how beautiful she was or what a genius she was. Like she was surprised. They were effortless together, they just fit, they made sense.

That evening after the show, Damon drove them to the same hotel they went to to crash Amos' party. He had booked a beautiful room, stocked it with flowers and champagne and chocolate covered strawberries.

The elevator ride to the fifteenth floor was even better this go round and Bonnie wasn't sending him away this time.

The look on Bonnie's face when he opened the door, told him he had done very good.

"Damon, this is beautiful," she said taking in the bouquets of red roses that covered every table in the room.

"You like it?" he asked, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin over her shoulder.

"I love it," she replied.

"Does it blow dinner, movie, ice cream out of the water?"

"Yes! You have eviscerated the dinner, movie, ice cream date!" She turned in his arms and wrapped hers around his neck.

She stared up into the eyes of the man she loved and opened her mouth to speak, but Damon stopped her. "Don't do it! You're about to get all sentimental and gushy. Just gimme a minute. Go light some candles." In a heartbeat he was gone, leaving her standing there with nothing but a breeze.

"I don't get sentimental and gushy, thank you very much," Bonnie scoffed. She found a small white votive candle in a glass dish on the low coffee table and with a quickly whispered _incendia_ she lit it and found another and lit it too. She looked around and found a candle on the floor and another two feet from it and another. He had left a trail of candles for her to follow.

" _Incendia_ ," she said with a smile and they lit all at once. She followed the candlelit path to the balcony and found him waiting for her with a grin on his face.

"What is this?" she asked suspiciously looking around at a dozen more bouquets of roses and candles everywhere.

"This Bonnie Bennett, is where I tell you that I am in love with you."

Tears sprang to her eyes and fell immediately and she swiped them away.

"This is where I tell you that you are the woman of my dreams, the woman that made a man out of me a hundred and fifty years after the fact."

Bonnie's heart was pounding in her ears and she stepped forward so she could hear him better.

"This is where I tell you that you have me. I am here for you. I know you feel like everyone in your life has abandoned you, but not me. You are stuck with me, Miss Bennett," he finished.

 _Oh steady me, be my source of gravity_

 _While my world's unraveling_

 _Say you'll never change_

Bonnie walked the last couple feet to him and wrapped her fingers around the lapels of his jacket and pulled him in to kiss him. "I love you."

"Good, cause that could've gone another way," he laughed.

"Gah, you are so cute when you're being all epic and romantic."

"Well, even I have my moments," he said with a shrug.

"You sure do, Mr. Salvatore."

 _When all is shaken, be my safety_

 _In a world uncertain, say you'll be my stone_

… _._


	9. Track 8 Overdose

Track #8- Overdose

 _Boy, I want off of this roller coaster_

 _You take me high just to bring me down_

 _Oh, when you bring me down…_

Bonnie and Damon were together only two more weeks before the shit hit the fan.

Before Damon realized their murderer was Alaric.

Before Esther turned Alaric into an Original vampire to kill her children, tying his lifeline with the doppleganger's.

Before Bonnie and Damon left to store Klaus' body.

Before Ric died in Damon's arms.

And Elena was turned.

…

They brought Alaric home that night and neither of them could form a sentence on the drive back. Bonnie kept thinking about how her oldest friend had died without her there. That instead of fighting each other they should have been protecting each other. And now she couldn't even say goodbye.

Damon held her hand the whole way home.

His best friend was gone and had died while literally fighting him. He didn't do the killing but he felt responsible all the same. If he'd been there for him more instead of so wrapped up in his own relationship he would have noticed sooner that something wasn't right. He should have been able to stop this from happening to him.

"What are we gonna do?" Bonnie asked him. Like he was supposed to have all the answers.

"I don't know, anymore."

"We did everything we were supposed to do. We got Klaus sharing a body with one of his hybrids. We hid him, saved his bloodline. Saved you… We did everything."

"I know."

They drove quickly and made it to Mystic Falls General within an hour. Damon led Bonnie by the hand into the hospital in search of his brother. They found Caroline, Jeremy, and Matt all standing in a hallway.

Matt got to her first, clutching her and crying, "I'm sorry, Bonnie, I was trying to get her out of town, we were trying to save her, and-"

"Shhh-I know, Matt, I know," Bonnie murmured repeatedly.

"Bonnie," Caroline said. She was leaning against the wall and staring at her feet.

Damon left Bonnie with her friends and entered the morgue where Stefan sat staring at Elena's lifeless body.

Damon looked at her and felt his gut clench. The last time he had talked to her she called him a liar. But once upon a time he had loved her... hadn't he?

"Stefan?"

Damon put a hand on his shoulder and Stefan shrugged it off.

"Stefan."

"No."

"Stefan, you can't sit on here like this. Come on," Damon tried to urge him out of the room.

"No, Damon. She's-"

"I know, come on. You need some air," Damon dragged his brother up by the arm and Stefan twisted loose and pinned Damon to the wall of refrigerated lockers.

"No!"

They were interrupted by a wracking cough coming from the table and when Damon looked again, Elena was no longer lifeless.

"Stefan," she gasped, and he was by her side instantly.

"I'm right here," he told her, holding her hand.

"Oh, shit," Damon said.

"Damon? You're here." She looked at him and smiled.

Damon only raised his eyebrows at her more.

The door swung open behind them and Jeremy entered the room with Caroline and Bonnie right on his heels.

"Elena!" he sighed, and ran to her, shoving past a still stunned Damon.

"What happened? Where are we?" Elena sat up and looked down at her damp clothes.

Bonnie gasped, "Is she-?"

"Yeah," Damon nodded confirmation.

"Elena, look at me," Stefan called for her attention. "You are going to be fine. You and Matt were in an accident."

"What?" she looked around the room at all the faces staring back at her. "Matt? Is he okay? Where is he?" Tears were already choking her voice as she looked around for him.

"I'm here, Elena," Matt stepped into the room but hung back by the door. "I'm okay," he croaked.

"Oh, thank God," Elena exhaled with a laugh. "Oh, I thought for a second…." She smiled in relief and looked at the mournful faces surrounding her. "If he's fine and I'm…"

She finally looked down at the hard metal gurney she lay on, then back up at the steel drawers on the wall.

"Stefan…?"

"Earlier today, when you passed out, your injuries were more severe than Dr. Fell let on," Stefan told her softly. "She used Damon's blood to help you."

"So? What does that mean?"

"Means you're in transition," Damon butt in, "You're becoming a vampire."

Bonnie wasn't sure if her and Damon should stay or go until Elena reached out to her and Bonnie couldn't help herself. She gave Elena a huge hug.

"I'm so sorry, Elena," she whispered with tears in her eyes.

"Oh Bonnie, it's okay. I forgive you," Elena told her graciously.

Bonnie pulled back to look at her former best friend, with her brown eyes glistening with a myriad of emotions that Bonnie could read just like a book: she was relieved she was still kind of alive, and scared of transitioning, but also nervous, low key excited, and happy that Bonnie was finally apologizing and ending their stalemate. Bonnie knew her inside and out and it seemed Elena still didn't know jack.

"I meant, that I'm sorry _you died today_. I'm sorry _this happened_ to you, Lena," Bonnie said with a sad shake of her head. "And I'm sorry about _Alaric_ ," she said, since obviously Elena wasn't thinking about him at all.

"Alaric?"

"Yeah, the man who loved you like you were his own daughter, whose life was connected to yours, he died tonight. And he doesn't get to come back," Bonnie bit back her own tears.

"Oh my god, Ric," Elena gasped. And there it was: the pain in her eyes as she finally thought of someone else.

"Yeah. Take care, Elena," she turned to her ex-boyfriend, "Jeremy, I am so sorry."

She ducked her head and slipped out of the room, before Elena could start bawling.

Damon wasn't fortunate enough to miss the waterworks. She was suddenly collapsing, gasping and sobbing and Stefan was scooping her up off the floor and carrying her from the room.

Everyone left standing there was quiet for a moment before Jeremy asked "Where is he?"

Damon looked at the poor kid and sighed. "He's out in the truck. I'll bury him."

"No. We're gonna do it right this time."

Caroline spoke up for the first time since she walked in the room, "I can talk to the people at the funeral home, get them to take the body."

"People will have questions," Damon shook his head.

"I can handle questions," Caroline rolled her eyes.

Damon studied the three kids standing before him and realized they weren't going to let this go. And he didn't want them to, he wanted to do right by Ric too.

"Okay. But we do this smart. Nobody else can know."

….

The funeral took place the following morning. Damon and Bonnie arrived together to say goodbye to one of the best men either of them had ever known.

Everyone shared a memory of Alaric, but when Damon spoke about losing him Bonnie lost it. She was just so tired of burying people she cared about.

Matt came and put an arm around her shoulders and she buried her head in his chest, taking comfort in a steady strength that hadn't failed her yet. Bonnie knew he needed that hug just as much if not more than she did so she held on even longer.

She held onto her friend so long she didn't see when Elena sidled up to Damon and thanked him for bringing Alaric home to her and for saying such, well, not all kind, but heartfelt things about Ric.

Bonnie didn't see what prompted the exchange between the two, but she did catch the hug at the end and the look on Damon's face when he let her go. And she definitely saw his face when he finally looked over at her and realized she had been watching. That face that said he'd been caught doing something he shouldn't have.

Bonnie cut her eyes to something else, anything else, and they landed on Stefan. He was watching, too. She walked over to him and hugged him as well. "How you doing, Stefan?"

"Another day in paradise, right?" He flashed her a small, there and gone smile.

"How's she doing?"

"She's holding it together, for now," he said. "But… I don't know. She never wanted this life for herself."

Bonnie had a million lame platitudes at the tip of her tongue: she'll be fine, it'll all work out, these things happen. But none of that seemed sincere or even near the truth.

"Yeah… just uh, don't let her kill anybody? She can't handle that."

Elena and Damon were heading back to them and Bonnie steeled herself.

"Hey, Bonnie," Elena began.

"Hey."

Both of them waited for the other to continue and when neither did, Damon took the lead, "So, Elena. I can't help but notice you're not snacking on the locals yet. What gives?"

"Damon," Elena sighed, clearly not wanting to discuss the matter at hand.

"What? We all know you're going to do it. You can't leave little Jere-Bear to his own devices, he'd get himself killed within the week. The only question is, what are you waiting for?"

"Leave her alone, Damon," Stefan said quietly, though secretly he agreed.

"I wanted to do this for Alaric before I… decided anything," Elena answered with her eyes on her feet.

"Like there's anything to decide. It's not a death sentence; you're just scared. Think of it as a lifestyle change. A high protein, liquid diet," Damon teased as he draped an arm around Bonnie's shoulders.

"Yeah, a liquid diet that comes with an unquenchable bloodlust…," Elena shuddered.

Damon grinned down at Bonnie, "Among other things."

Bonnie hid a coy smile; she knew exactly what other lusts were unquenchable.

Elena only shook her head at them and, taking Stefan's hand, she turned to leave.

"Just drink the blood, Elena. Stop all the theatrics," Damon called to her.

She paused and turned to stare back at him. Her eyes widened and she swallowed hard, but didn't say anything. She just continued on and leaning on Stefan, they left the cemetery.

"Come on, it's over now. Let's get out of here," Bonnie said.

Damon stopped her before she could step away and he pulled her back into him, placed his hands on either side of her face so she couldn't look away. "I love you," he told her softly. He watched her eyes carefully.

"I love you, too, Damon," she answered honestly. "But I would really like to leave this creepy ass cemetery, now."

Damon chuckled at her. They were going to be fine.

"This is not a _creepy_ cemetery."

"It's a cemetery; it is creepy by design."

"Oh please, Honey, I've been in _way_ creepier cemeteries."

"Okay see, that just makes you creepy, too," she reasoned.

Damon scoffed, but he couldn't exactly argue with that.

….

That evening Damon was hanging around the Boarding House to help Stefan watch Elena as she completed the transition. Caroline and Tyler joined them and they made it an impromptu welcome-to-the-living-dead party.

Stefan wanted to immediately take her hunting for local wildlife, but Elena wanted to follow Damon's lead and learn the perks of vampirism before dealing with the part she dreaded most.

So Damon gave her a blood bag and they all took her out for a run.

"That was amazing!" Elena gushed after running circles through the town so fast no humans could possibly see them.

"See, it's not so bad being a vampire, is it?" Damon said. They had returned to the boarding house and Damon was pouring himself a drink.

"Yeah, yeah. You were right, Damon. Is that what you wanted to hear?"

"Well, it never hurts to have it confirmed every now and then," he smirked.

"Whatever," Tyler cut in. "Elena, the hardest part for me was feeding. But after you get over that, you'll be fine. Life pretty much went on as normal."

"Normal?" Caroline laughed. "You were snacking on people for breakfast for weeks! That's not normal! No, as soon we get her a supply of blood bags, then she'll be normal."

"Right. Actually, there's something else she's going to need first," Stefan held up his hand and wiggled the finger that held his daylight ring.

"Bonnie hasn't made you a daylight ring yet?" Tyler asked.

"Well, we haven't exactly been talking lately." Elena and Caroline exchanged looks.

"Yeah well, good luck with that," Damon chuckled.

"What does that mean?" Elena asked him.

"It means you've pissed off your only witch and now _you_ need _her_ help," Damon said smugly.

"Damon, can't you talk to her, reason with her?" Elena whined.

"And why would I do that? I'm not the one she's mad at and I'd like to keep it that way."

Caroline rolled her eyes, "It's Bonnie, of course she'll help."

"Oh I never said she wouldn't. It's just not going to be easy," he smirked, glad to finally be on the right side of things, for once.

….

Bonnie was slowly getting ready for bed after stalling for hours, hoping Damon would decide to come back to her tonight. She was trying extra hard to be the bigger person and understand that he was doing it for Stefan and not for _her._ And who was she to stand between brothers, especially when they actually getting along together.

When her phone beeped alerting her to a text message Bonnie eagerly snatched it up, but her mood soured when she saw that it was the last person she wanted to hear from.

And she wanted to know if they could talk.

Bonnie sighed and rolled her eyes. She was tempted to not respond, act like she never got it. And she probably would have if her phone didn't start ringing the next second.

"Really?" Bonnie mumbled to herself. "It's been weeks and now all of a sudden you need to talk?"

Bonnie sat down on her bed and took a deep breath before answering. "Hello?"

"Hi, Bonnie," Elena breathed. "How are you?"

"Elena. I was just getting ready for bed… It's late." she reminded her.

"Right, sorry. I know it's late and all but I was wondering if we could talk."

"This can't wait until tomorrow? It's been a really long day."

"No kidding, I was turned into a vampire today." Elena tried to joke.

"You transitioned," Bonnie commented, totally unsurprised with the unnecessary recap on her life. "Well, like I said before, I am sorry this happened to you." Bonnie paused looking for a way to end the conversation right there. "Good luck with everything?"

Elena sighed and obviously decided to cut the niceties. "Right, well that's sort of why I'm calling. Bonnie, I… need your help. I was wondering if you could make me a daylight ring…" the last part of that was said so quiet that Bonnie almost didn't catch it.

"Excuse me?" she replied.

"I know that we have been at odds lately, Bonnie, and I'm sorry about that. I'm sorry about all those things I said to you about- about Damon and you being together. You didn't deserve that." Elena let out a relieved breath, like she'd covered all her apology bases and it didn't actually strangle her to say it.

"You're sorry?" Bonnie repeated. She pinched the bridge of her nose, feeling a headache and more rising within her. "You're sorry, _now?_ Now that you're dead and transitioned and need the town witch to come to your rescue once again? _Now_ you're sorry? _Now_ I don't deserve how you treated me?" Bonnie would have laughed if she could get past the anger bubbling up in her chest.

"Bonnie, before all of this we were best friends. Like sisters. Why can't we get past this?" Elena asked.

"We can't get past this, Elena, because you're not sorry, you just need something, and honestly I'm not in a very forgiving mood. So you can take your sorry and find another witch to do your bidding." Bonnie quickly hung up before she resorted to name calling or worse.

Bonnie lurched to her feet and stomped to her closet and found a box of her Grams' crystals and headed for the backyard, mumbling to herself the whole way.

"Actually thinks I'm gonna help her ass after everything!"

"Some gotdamn nerve, calling me in the middle of the night, with some bullshit…"

"And I'm supposed to what, feel bad? Uh, no! I didn't do anything wrong, here! I'm not the one that came in here throwing accusations around.."

That's how Damon found her. In her nightgown, in her garden, crystals spread out in front of her and going off on an invisible audience.

"Are you cursing her or just cursing?" Damon wondered aloud.

"I haven't decided yet." Bonnie peeked at him and closed her eyes again. Damon's presence calmed her 10 times more than her crystals ever could. She focused on channeling her burgeoning rage into charging one last crystal.

"I wasn't sure if you were coming over tonight," Bonnie said as she placed her stones back into their box.

"Things took a turn over at the Boarding House. Figured it'd be best if I head home," Damon said smoothly, trying to keep a straight face.

"Meaning, you know how my phone call with Elena went and you came to check on me? Make sure I didn't burn the kitchen down again?" Bonnie grimaced up at him.

"I'm sorry she pissed you off again." Damon settled in next to her, close enough she could rest her head on his shoulder.

"I'm not pissed. I'm not even sure why I was so surprised."

"For the record, I told them it was a bad idea to bother you tonight." he quipped dropping a kiss on the crown of her head.

"And they didn't believe you? Shocker."

"Babe, you know you don't have to do anything you don't want to do, right?"

"Yeah, I know. And it's not even that I don't want to help her- but who does she think she is?!" Bonnie was starting to get fired up again the more she thought about it.

Damon just chuckled and pushed her down to lay back in the grass, "That's my girl," he murmured before thoroughly taking her mind off it.

…

 _I'm trying not to take too much_

 _I'm in over my head_

 _Over love, oh I over trust..._

After a day of letting Elena sweat, Bonnie sent Damon back to the Boarding House with a daylight ring, a truly hideous hunk of silver (she may have been a bigger person but she wasn't that big). Bonnie tried to return to her regularly scheduled programming. Too bad Elena had other plans.

The newborn vampire kept begging Damon to come hunting with her. Apparently Stefan wasn't too excited about taking her to find innocent people to drink from.

Damon told Bonnie repeatedly it was for Stefan, so that he wouldn't be tempted to fall off the wagon. And how could she argue with that? Stefan on the "real stuff" was a nightmare that nobody needed right now.

Didn't mean she liked being stood-up by her boyfriend. But her and Damon were better than good. Right?

…

 _Over and over_

 _I let you under my skin_

 _And it's over_

 _I promise never again_

 _You come over_

 _Something takes over me_

 _I can't control this hallucinogen_

"Damon, I need you. I can't do this by myself," Elena whined for the umpteenth time.

They were two towns over attempting to drink the bar dry and pick up someone for Elena to eat and compel.

Damon rolled his eyes at her with a smirk. "You keep using that line on me and I'm not sure how long I'm gonna believe it."

"But it's true!" Elena smiled. "You're _too_ good at this."

"Now, now, flattery will get you everywhere Miss Gilbert," he flirted automatically.

"Really? Everywhere?" She said leaning into him.

"Down girl," Damon told her. "I'm a happily taken man, remember."

"I remember," her lips said. But her eyes were saying she didn't care, as they lingered on Damon's lips.

"Elena…" he warned her. As happily taken as he was, he wasn't blind. Or unaffected.

"What?" she batted her eyes innocently.

"You know what. You're trying to get me in trouble, aren't you?" He couldn't help it, he was wired this way, Elena's drunken flirting was appealing to him.

"As if I could, Damon," Elena slid off her barstool and landed squarely between Damon's spread legs, brushing as much of herself on him as she could. "How bout I find someone to teach me how to play pool?" Her big shiny eyes stared up at him.

"You wanna watch?" she asked before slinking away.

Damon tossed his drink back and swallowed slowly.

Trouble. Definitely trouble.

….

 _Give me the chance to pick up the pieces you left me in_

 _Why did I let you in?_

 _Overzealous, I'm over this_

 _Oh, I'm over us..._

It only took two more weeks of Damon running off to Elena's rescue for Bonnie to realize that the sinking feeling in her gut wasn't going away.

Damon told her, over and over, that it wasn't like that, he didn't feel that way about Elena anymore, that he wanted to be with her-

"Damon, if you wanted to be with me, you'd be here with me! Instead you're spending another night playing Elena's knight in shining armor! I needed you tonight!" She was dangerously close to whining, and she hated that. Whining never solved anything. She was pacing the floor of her bedroom and trying not to scream into her phone.

"Bon, this hunter situation isn't going to solve itself! And _you_ were the one that declined the invitation to step in and help the Scoobies, so what options does that leave me with, huh?

Was he really turning this around on her? "Oh, so it's my fault that I can't tear you away from Elena's side long enough to have a fucking meal? I asked you for one night, D! _One night!_ To sit down and be with me and my _dad_. You _knew…_ " She took a deep breath and took the phone from her ear for a moment to catch her breath. _Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry,_ she told herself. When she was sure her voice wouldn't betray her, she spoke again, her tone cold and even. "You know what, Damon? Don't worry about it."

"Bonnie-"

"If you don't wanna be here, I'm not about to beg you to be with me.

"Dammit, Bonnie, don't do this!" his voice growled through clenched teeth.

"I'm not the one doing this, you are."

"Bonnie, nothing is going on!" he swore.

"Stop lying to me! You really think I don't _know_ when you're lying to me? Every time you open your mouth my stomach burns!" She was shaking now with the effort to fight back her angry tears. "I can feel it in every inch of my skin, in my very magic. I know you. And _I know you're lying_."

Damon was silent on the other end of the line.

"So, no. I'm not going to keep sitting here, waiting for you, letting you make a fool outta me. If you think for even a second that you want to explore these feelings or whatever you have for Elena, then do it. Have at it," her voice cracked, "just don't expect me to wait for you to figure out that you lost a good thing. Your choice."

"Don't," was all he could say.

Bonnie didn't respond, just listened to him breathe for a moment before she ended the call.

She stood looking at her phone in her hand. Almost willing it to ring. Willing him to call her back and tell her there was no choice, it was her, only her, always her. But the ringer remained silent.

"Oh god," she whispered, already regretting the way she ended it. Her head was pounding and her eyes filled with tears that immediately slipped down her face.

 _Oh, and I overdose_

 _Boy, I want off of this roller coaster_

 _You take me high just to bring me down_

 _Oh, when you bring me down_

…..

Damon stared down at his phone like it wasn't even his. Like he was unsure of what just happened. His eyes roved over the ground, searching for something, like he had physically lost a piece of himself.

Hearing Bonnie like that, it hurt him. Knowing that he was the cause of her pain it caused an ache of his own. An ache he didn't know how to relieve.

Damon stepped back into the kitchen of the Gilbert house and immediately poured a glass of bourbon, hoping it would soothe that phantom ache in his gut, in his mind.

"Damon," her voice called to him. "You okay?"

He lifted his eyes to find her there, gazing at him, intense as always.

"Where'd Stefan get to?" he dodged her question with one of his own.

"He said he needed some space. I told you," she sidled closer, leaning on the counter next to him, "it's not really working between us. He can't even stand to look at me like this."

"There's nothing wrong with you." he replied automatically.

"Please, I'm a mess," Elena argued tucking her long hair behind her ear.

Damon felt like his tongue was choking him. Begging him to remain silent. But he spoke anyway.

"Elena, you know you're gorgeous." He watched as his hand moved, almost of its own accord, and swept the new vampire's dark locks back over her shoulder, leaving her neck and chest bared.

"Damon…" she whispered, coming closer.

"Elena." Damon slammed his hands down on the counter, trying to smash some kind of feeling back into them. He must have been losing his mind, to even consider….

Because he loved Bonnie. He was in love with Bonnie. And she loved him back. And he couldn't do that to her. He wouldn't. This time he could be the good guy and do the right thing and just say no.

He could do that… except…

 _Oh, and I overdose._

Her eyes were gazing up at him and she was talking to him, telling him it was okay to want to be with her, and it could be just this once, and she needed him the way he needed her, and she was surrounding him with that smell that was all her own, not earthy and herbal and magic, but creamy and vanilla and peachy, and tasting so sweet and she felt so strong now, pushing him to where she wanted him and they were crashing their way upstairs and he was in her bedroom before he pulled back, his breaths dragging in and out.

And he paused. All he needed was a second to change his mind. Just one second.

….

 _We fight, we laugh_

 _Detox, rehab_

 _Letting go of what we had..._

The knock on the door startled Bonnie awake. Her heart jumped as she sat up from the couch and blinked away the few hours of rest she had managed to get. She ran her hands over her face and hair, feeling how puffy and swollen her eyes were.

The knock was turning impatient, giving away the identity of the person behind it this early in the morning.

Bonnie stood and let the blankets fall to the floor at her feet, and she stepped over them, slowly making her way to the front door. But she hesitated, her hand resting on the knob as tears sprang to her eyes all over again.

This time she didn't even try to fight them. She had given up that battle hours ago. She honestly didn't think there were any more tears left in her to cry at this point.

She was wrong about that, too.

"Bonnie?" Damon said through the door. "Bonnie… I know you're there, I can hear you. And you already know that." He raised his hand to bang on the door again, but managed to resist. He cleared his throat, "Would you open the door? Please?"

Nothing but a heartbeat came from the otherside, but he thought he could actually hear her eyes rolling.

"Look, I know I screwed up, but…" Damon didn't even know how to finish that sentence. "I screw up. You knew that when you met me," he tried to laugh.

He definitely heard a sigh that time.

"Okay. I know that's not an excuse, but it is what it is!"

 _Was that a huff? Or a scoff?_

"Fine, that's lame too." He sighed, pacing away from the door and back again. "Open the door, Bonnie. Come on, this is us. It's you and me against the world, right? It's still just you and me, and I am dying out here Bon, please. I…"

Bonnie stood on the other side of the door listening to him struggle to find words. Why was it so hard to apologize? Usually she couldn't get him to shut up. And for the life of her she didn't know why she found it endearing .

"I need you. I might be a dick, but I need you, Bonnie Bennett. You make me… want to _not_ be a dick," he admitted.

"I love you, babe. And I need you to open up, so that I can say that to your face and not this- damn door," his voice wavered with a final thump to the solid wood between them.

Bonnie took another moment, waiting to see if he had anything left to say before she turned the doorknob and opened it, squinting out into the morning sunlight.

Damon sighed when the door finally creaked open, but that relief was stopped short when he saw her face. Her usually shining and happy face now featured tear stains, even as a few fresh ones pooled in her eyes..

Damon stared at her with those intense blue eyes, wide and beseeching, slightly crazed and begging forgiveness.

Bonnie stared right back, trying to find the crack in his facade, any hint that he wasn't being honest, but she couldn't see it. Honestly, she didn't want to see it.

She glanced down at the pink and purple flowers, and Damon followed her gaze, remembering the side trip he made across town to compel a florist to make him a bouquet of roses and peonies.

"For you," he held them out to her and for a moment he didn't think she would take them.

Bonnie hesitated, again, before opening the door all the way and accepting the flowers. At least he had gotten that right. She brought them to her face, expecting their sweet smell to wash over her, but her face scrunched in confusion: ash. She sniffed again, discreetly, and figured something was off with her sense of smell; maybe she was just congested, she thought with a shake of her head.

She still hadn't said anything, couldn't find her voice after crying herself to sleep. But she stepped back and let him in.

He crossed the threshold, relieved; he knew that getting inside would be the hardest part.

He shut the door behind him and leaned against it, like that would allow him to shut out the rest of their troubles.

"Bonnie, I love you so much," he reached for her, arms open, like he had so many times before and naturally, like she couldn't stop herself, she stepped into his embrace and let him fold her up in his arms.

Bonnie sank into him, let his touch sooth the very pain which he had caused. Silently, she let him wipe the tears from her cheeks and chin. He placed a kiss to her temple and the crown of her messy head; all he could do was hold onto that moment, hold onto her, for as long he could.

…

 _Over and over_

 _I'm falling under your spell_

 _Call me over_

 _I'm runnin' back to this hell_

Damon heard the car pull up outside. He heard a car door open and a set of heels hit the pavement before the door slammed shut.

But before that car door had even opened, he'd kissed the sleeping witch in his arms and gently pulled himself from underneath her.

He bolted downstairs, pulling his pants on as he went, and managed to open the door before the baby vampire could hit the doorbell.

"Elena, what are doing here?" he asked through clenched teeth keeping his voice down.

" _Me_?" she replied, her voice hitching a couple octaves higher. "Me? What am I doing here? What the hell are you doing here, Damon? I haven't seen or heard from you in two days!"

"Keep! Your. Voice. Down," he hissed. "I know it's been two days, I figured eventually you would get the message that I don't want to talk about this and then _let it go._ Leave, Elena. You can't be here," he turned to go back into the house.

Elena's were wide as she grabbed his arm and pulled him back around to face her "You can't be serious? You're going back to her?"

"I love her, Elena." he carefully broke the grip she had on him and pushed her away. "I already told you that."

"But you also said you love _me,_ " she cried. "You love me, Damon. I know you do."

"I did. But it's not what I have with her. And last I checked you were still dragging things out with my brother. Just go home, Elena."

"Are you seriously breaking up with me?" her eyes welled with tears.

"No, I'm not, because we are NOT together! What we did was a mistake-"

"But we could be, we should be, you know I'm right."

Tired of explaining this to her, Damon put on his serious face, his 'I am about murder someone' face, "Get off this porch and go home, El-"

The door behind him swung open to reveal Bonnie standing there, with a murder face all her own. It wasn't in the lines of her face, or the set of her mouth, she held those unnaturally tight.

But her eyes. They were dark green and Damon thought for a moment he saw sparks flicker in them.

She turned her head once from the half naked vampire she had expected to wake up to, to the vampire that used to be her best friend.

Bonnie looked her up and down, noting how much she had changed since the last time they had seen each other. Elena was clearly embracing her new vampire lifestyle if the leather wedge boots, black jeans, and heavy makeup were any indication. It was almost as if she were mimicking the vampire that created her…

And again, Bonnie's gut, no, her intuition, which seemed to live in her gut these days, twisted.

"Bonnie, let me explain," Damon approached carefully, his gut and intuition sensing danger.

"I really don't think there's a need," her voice was low and soft, as she finally lifted her chin to look him straight in the eye.

"Bonnie, please-"

"Don't bother begging. We are done, now." She looked to Elena and said, "You win, you can have him."

"Bonnie, I-"

"Save it, Elena. I don't care anymore." With one last look at the man she loved she told him "Take your sireling and stay the hell away from me."

She twitched her fingers and the door slammed in his face.

And behind Bonnie, the vase of roses and peonies burst into flames.

 _Oh, when you bring me down_...


End file.
